UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath (File)
The Yogi Adityanath government has recommended a CBI probe into alleged financial irregularities into the Gomti riverfront project initiated during the previous regime. Secretary (Home) Bhagwan Swaroop confirmed on Thursday that a letter recommending a CBI investigation has been sent to the Department of Personnel & Training (DoPT).
Acting on a judicial probe report, the government had earlier chargesheeted former chief secretary Deepak Singhal and issued a notice to another chief secretary Alok Ranjan, along with other officials. Singhal had been principal secretary (irrigation) when the project started.
On June 19, an FIR was lodged against eight serving and retired officials of the irrigation department on the basis of the report submitted by the judicial probe panel headed by retired High Court judge Alok Kumar Singh. The FIR had been registered on a complaint of an executive engineer of the Sharda Canal, Lucknow Circle, under IPC Sections 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) and the Prevention of Corruption Act.
Adityanath inspected the project site after he took charge and expressed dissatisfaction when told that 95 per cent of the allotted amount was used up in just 35 per cent of the work.
