Shiromani Akali Dal rubbishes charge that implicates deputy CM in bribery case

CHANDIGARH: Former state industries director V K Janjua moved a petition before a local court on Monday alleging Sukhbir Badal had implicated him in a corruption case because he refused to pay the deputy CM a Rs 1 crore bribe. Shiromani Akali Dal dismissed the charge as “frivolous”.

Calling Janjua a “corruptiontainted officer”, the party called it the result of a “deal between two desperados — a tainted officer facing certain conviction and the PPCC president facing certain defeat”.

Janjua, an IAS officer, was arrested by a vigilance team from Ludhiana on November 9, 2009 on a complaint from T R Mishra, a Ludhiana industrialist. Mishra claimed that the officer had demanded a Rs 2-lakh bribe to clear a file. Janjua was then director industries, Punjab. He was suspended and later reinstated.

At present, he’s secretary in the freedom fighters department. Janjua deposed before CJM, Chandigarh, J S Sidhu, that Sukhbir had framed him with help of his “chief lieutenant” and director, vigilance bureau, Sumedh Singh Saini. Janjua gave the court cell phone details of Mishra and vigilance officers to prove he was “framed”.

The CJM sought clarifications and evidence from Janjua to support his allegations by January 21. Janjua pleaded that the probe into his allegations be handed over to the Chandigarh UT Police with the court monitoring it.

Inspector-general (IG), vigilance, Kuldeep Singh, said Janjua’s charges were baseless because he was arrested in front of independent witnesses and after following due procedure. “He was produced before the magistrate but he never made such allegations earlier. It is an afterthought.”