AEN, 5 held for siphoning off metal scrap worth crores

Jaipur: An assistant engineer (AEN) of Heerapura Power House was arrested by Jaipur Crime Branch for allegedly siphoning off tonnes of metal scrap worth several crores, from the government facility. The contractor who was given the tender for taking an authorised quantity of the scrap and four others, have also been arrested.
The engineer and the contractor were hand-in-glove in the illegal operation of transporting more than the authorised metal scrap out of the facility, to sell it elsewhere. Police have seized two trucks of the same number plate, which were used for transporting the extra metal scrap.
The arrested AEN has been identified as Arun Verma (35) while the contractor, Ramavatar Meena (65), his sons — Surendra (36) and Dinesh (32) — along with their accomplices Rajveer Singh (26) and Ajit Singh (45) were also arrested.
Prasanna Kumar Khamesra, additional commissioner crime added, “For last 15 days, we were keeping a watch on Ramavatar and one of our sources told us that he was taking out more metal scrap from the power house than he was supposed to. He had the contract to take out approximately 6-7 tonnes of scrap from the power house, but he would take much more than that. On a tip-off, we seized his trucks which had 32 tonnes of metal scrap in them.”
A special team comprising Bhura Ram, Ram Niwas and Abhimanyi had learnt about the scam a few days ago.
The modus operandi, as revealed during investigation, was that two trucks having same licence plate, were used by Ramavatar to transport the unauthorised quantity of metal scrap. While one truck had the metal scrap as per the contract and was prepared beforehand, the other carried the extra metal. This was done to ensure that only one number plate is registered in the records when the truck was weighed before leaving the facility. Once he received the receipt for the weight, the vehicle loaded with the extra scrap metal would leave the power house.
In this exercise, he was helped by Verma, who ensured that no one detected anything suspicious. According to the officials, Ramavatar was the kingpin of this whole operation. He had worked in NBC in 2002 following which he got into the scrap business. He had the contract of Heerapura Power House for last two years, but had been doing illegal activities in other places since 2012, claimed officials. Allegedly, he illegally transported metal scrap worth crores. He also persuaded the accused AEN to help him in this crime.
Officials found that Ramavatar also owned 13 luxury vehicles, four trucks and two pick-ups. A case against the accused has been registered under IPC sections 420 (cheating), 469 (forgery) and 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant), among others.
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