Haryana Vigilance Bureau has caught eight accused including a sub-divisional officer (SDO), two junior engineers, two police officials, a tubewell helper and two private persons red-handed in the last 24 hours while accepting bribes worth Rs 2.62 lacs in separate incidents in Karnal, Kurukshetra and Faridabad districts.

Sharing this information on Friday, a spokesperson of the Vigilance Bureau said in the first case, Manish Lamba, SDO  and Pawan Kumar, junior engineer of the Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam  (UHBVN) posted at Nissing, Karnal and private driver of the SDO were caught with Rs One lakh bribe money.

They have taken bribes from a farmer for removing power lines from his fields at Nissing.

“When the accused officials had not removed electric wires from his fields even after taking Rs 3.5 lakh from him, the farmer approached the Vigilance Bureau. After verifying the complaint, a team laid a trap and arrested them red-handed with the bribe money,” he said.

In another case, Vigilance Bureau has arrested sub-inspector (SI) Jaikaran posted as incharge Police Post, Sector-7, Kurukshetra and lady assistant SI Kiran of Woman Police Station, Kurukshetra red-handed while accepting Rs 60,000 bribe.

The complainant, Neha had sold household furniture to Kajal and when she along with her husband had gone to the buyer’s place and asked for money, the lady lodged a complaint against them with the police for molestation and assault.

The investigation of the case was handed over to SI Jaikaran and ASI Kiran. Both the accused officials were demanding Rs 60,000 in lieu of getting the case settled.

In a separate case, a Bureau’s team caught junior engineer, Kapil Bhardwaj of Municipal Corporation, Faridabad along with Yogesh Kumar a tubewell helper red-handed while accepting Rs One lakh bribe on the complaint of Sudhir Vasdev.

The accused tubewell helper had demanded Rs Three lakh on behalf of the junior engineer for not demolishing the building being constructed by the complainant.

The complainant who did not wish to pay the bribe approached the Bureau and after verifying the information, a team laid a trap and caught both the accused accepting Rs One lakh as bribe.

In yet another case, a vigilance team from Faridabad arrested Ankur Soni, a private person while accepting Rs 2,000 bribe in lieu of making a correction in the complainant’s ration card.