UP engineer suspended after his arrest by CBI for alleged sexual abuse of over 50 children

CHITRAKOOT/BANDA: Authorities have suspended a junior engineer of the Uttar Pradesh irrigation department after he was arrested by the CBI for alleged sexual exploitation of children for last 10 years and selling videos and photographs of nefarious acts on dark net to paedophiles across the globe, officials said on Wednesday.

Principal engineer V K Niranjan said in an order that the junior engineer has been suspended with immediate effect for immorality.

The accused was produced in a court in Banda on Wednesday and the CBI sought his five-day remand.

"As the defence counsel sought time, the court adjourned the hearing till Thursday and sent the accused to jail. The court will hear the matter on Thursday," district government counsel Manoj Kumar said.

The junior engineer was arrested from Banda on Tuesday by a dedicated unit of the CBI specialising in Online Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation Prevention/ Investigation (OCSAE).

On the arrest, Superintendent of Police Ankit Mittal on Wednesday said, "An eight-member CBI team had been camping in the district since November 2, but the police were not aware of the matter it was probing. The CBI team had repeatedly questioned the junior engineer and his driver."

The arrested junior engineer, a resident of Chitrakoot district, is alleged to have victimised about 50 children in the age group of 5-16 years in the districts of Chitrakoot, Banda and Hamirpur.

During searches, the CBI had recovered eight mobile phones, cash around rupees eight lakh, sex toys, laptop, and other digital evidence carrying huge amount of child sexual abuse material, agency officials said earlier.

It is alleged that the junior engineer was operational for the last 10 years, mainly contacting and sharing child sexual abuse material with other paedophiles globally using dark net and cloud services abroad, they said.

He is understood to have told the investigators that he used to bribe the children with mobile phones and other electronic gadgets to keep their mouth shut about his activities, they said.