DRI officer who called bribe a 'sin' arrested: What happened in Ludhiana?

The Central Bureau of Investigation — famed for checks and balances during its probes, and where serious corruption cases are monitored at the level of its chief, the Director — arrested a senior Directorate of Revenue Intelligence officer, Chandra Shekhar, who told the alleged middleman it was a sin to accept bribe and money should be thrown in a canal, show documents seen by The Federal.

The alleged middleman, Ludhiana-based industrialist Rajesh Dhanda, was attempting to deliver a bribe of Rs 25 lakh to Chandra Shekhar at the latter's residence in a “controlled delivery” at the behest of a CBI probe team.

Part One: 'Fight' for dead DRI officer's reputation, arrested by CBI despite saying no to bribe

In the first part of the two-part series, readers were informed that Chandra Shekhar was arrested by the CBI on January 1, 2020 along two alleged middlemen – Dhanda and Anup Joshi.

CBI lays a trap

The CBI alleged that Dhanda and Joshi was seeking a bribe on behalf of Chandra Shekhar from Sudhir Gulati, an exporter who claimed that there was a DRI investigation pending against him. According to Gulati, the alleged middlemen assured him that they would get matter settled if money was paid to them.

On December 31 that year, the CBI laid a trap in a Delhi hotel where Dhanda and Joshi met Gulati. The agency team detained Dhanda and Joshi, claiming they were caught red-handed while receiving money from Gulati. According to CBI documents, after the “trap” in Delhi, the agency officials took Dhanda to Chandra Shekhar’s residence in Ludhiana the next day where he tried to “bribe” the DRI official in what the CBI termed a controlled delivery.

Documents show, when the middleman attempted the “controlled delivery” of bribe, the agency sleuths made him wear a recording device in which the conversation between him and Chandra Shekhar was recorded.

Transcript of conversation

Here is an English translation of an important portion of the conversation, transcribed by the CBI. The conversation took place in Hindi and Punjabi.

Chandra Shekhar – Where will I take this (money)?

Dhanda – Keep it now, I will come later and see.

(When Dhanda was picked up by the CBI he was supposed fly to Dubai from Delhi for celeberate New Year with family there and Chandra Shekhar knew this when Dhanda told him to keep the money)

Conversation continues...

C- I don’t need this (money), this is (slang) greed.

D - You keep it when I come back.

C - No, no, Dhanda saab, you keep it.

D - Now, Anup (Joshi, the second alleged middleman) asked for the first time...you keep it, I have to go (to Dubai).

C - You keep it with you, okay, you can leave it at my Delhi residence, okay.

D - You keep it here...now, where will I leave it in Delhi?

C - No, no at my home. I will give you the keys.

D -I am going somewhere, I will find a solution and take (the money) back by afternoon or evening.

C - No, No, you take it away from here.

D - Sir, I have to go urgently now, by afternoon or evening….

C - No, you hold this. I cannot take this. You take it and go or tell me what has happened…

D - I will tell you.

C - No, no…

D - I tell you there is nothing…

C - Tell me please what happened…

D - I am in deep trouble. My situation is very bad, I cannot tell you…My mind is spinning but I cannot tell you…

C - You have to tell me what has happened…

D - I will come to your office (at) 10-1…

C - You were about to leave for Dubai…

D - Came to meet you sir, and then I will tell you…I was very troubled.

C - You take this with you.

D - You keep it, Sir.

C - I don’t need it…see, I have never taken (anything) from you like this here.

D - You never took...I have to go…understand I have to go for important work. The car is with the driver. I have another car...I have to change cars. The conversation with you is done and I am leaving…system can not be made…will come back at 11-12 to meet you.

C-You hold this and take it away. Will meet at 10-11 o’clock. Okay and then we will talk. Throw it in a canal, this is sin, this is sin…don’t keep it

The transcript of the whole conversation runs into 10 pages.

Under pressure: Dhanda

“It is clear from full transcript, never once Chandra Shekhar ji agreed to keep the money. I was under pressure from the CBI officers to leave money at his residence somehow, so I continued to press him to keep the money but when I was leaving from his residence, he threw the bag of money in the lift which was in front of the entrance of his residence. I am sure all of this was recorded in the device I was wearing. At one point during the conversation, when I desperately continued to press him to take the money, in order to get rid of me, he said he would make some arrangement to keep the money somewhere,” Dhanda told The Federal.

Also read | Najeeb missing case: Will challenge CBI closure report in HC, says mother

But the CBI claims that Chandra Shekhar got suspicious due to Dhanda’s apparent nervousness and merely postponed acceptance of the bribe.

Following the meeting with Dhanda, Chandra Shekhar locked his residence and went to office as the CBI team and Dhanda remained hidden around his residence.

DRI officer arrested

“If he was about to make any arrangement as the CBI claims he never called me and any call from him would have come to the notice of CBI officers who were with me all the time,” said Dhanda who was sent to Delhi along with the probe team.

Another team of agency officials went to the DRI office in Ludhiana to conducted search and seizure and from there they brought Chandra Shekhar back to his residence and searched it too. Chandra Shekhar was then arrested.

Interestingly, per CBI’s own admission later in the Delhi High Court, following the trap proceedings in the Delhi hotel, when Dhanda was made to talk to Chandra Shekhar and a course of “controlled delivery” was decided on, a Deputy Inspector General (DIG) rank Indian Police Service (IPS) official, Asra Garg, who was head of the CBI branch that conducted the operation, was present there.

Also, another IPS officer and branch Superintendent of Police (SP), R Jayalakshmi, went to Ludhiana with the probe team that carried out the controlled delivery part of operation.

Names not mentioned

However, the names of these two IPS officers were not mentioned in any case record. The CBI accepted their presence at both the spots, when Dhanda moved the Delhi High Court to preserve their call data records.

Also read | How a late-night warning had CBI team rushing from Bern with Bofors docs

The CBI’s pursuit of the matter did not end here.

In 2021, Chandra Shekhar and Anup Joshi died of COVID. The agency, in December 2021, filed formal charges against Dhanda only. But the special CBI judge returned the chargesheet saying since Chandra Shekhar, the only public servant arrested in the case, is no more, it cannot invoke sections of Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act.

But a year later, the agency filed an almost identical chargesheet again and this time a new judge was presiding the court. She took cognizance of it.

An individual fight

“My various challenges to the CBI’s probe and subsequent chargesheets remain pending in the Delhi High Court. My individual fight continuous but my original question remains unanswered still — what exactly happened to the corruption involving public servants and some exporters unearthed by Chandar Shekhar ji? Did the CBI investigate it as it has all the documents?” asked Dhanda while in a conversation with The Federal.

A detailed message sent to a CBI spokesperson seeking the agency's comment on the issues raised in this series remained unanswered. As and when the agency replies, the story will be updated.