Cuttack: The Orissa High Court on Thursday provided interim protection to senior IAS officer Bishnupada Sethi against any coercive action in the Rs 10-lakh bribery case till the next hearing.
The court also ordered interim security for Sethi amid growing legal and political scrutiny. The IAS officer has moved the court for anticipatory bail. The matter has been posted for July 8.
This comes days after the HC dismissed a writ petition filed by him, seeking to quash the ongoing CBI investigation against him related to the bribery case.
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The officer is under CBI scanner over his alleged links with general manager of the central PSU Bridge and Roof Company (India) Limited, Chanchal Mukherjee, who arrested near a hotel at Jayadev Vihar in Bhubaneswar while allegedly taking Rs 10 lakh bribe from the director of a Bhubaneswar-based Penta A Studio Private Ltd and a middle-man identified as Debadutta Mohapatra, in December last year.
After issuing summons to Sethi, the central agency on February 18 conducted searches at his official residence in Bhubaneswar. His family too faced intense scrutiny. Following which, Sethi, along with his wife and daughter, filed a petition on February 24 seeking the HC’s intervention, alleging mental harassment by CBI officers. The court, however, dismissed it, stating that extraordinary writ powers cannot be misused as a shield against legitimate inquiries, regardless of the petitioners’ positions.
The 1995-batch officer was also shunted out of three departments he was heading due to the investigation. Sethi, who was in-charge of social security and empowerment of persons with disabilities department, ST&SC development department, and Odisha language department, was posted as officer on Special Duty (OSD) of the general administration and public grievance department, a seemingly insignificant posting.
