A Mohali court has sentenced SP (Vigilance) Amandeep Kaur, 57, and Ludhiana businessman Rajinder Singh, 43, to three years of rigorous imprisonment along with a fine of Rs 10,000 each in connection with a 2011 criminal conspiracy and abetment-to-suicide case involving excise and taxation officer (ETO) Ranjit Singh. The case pertained to allegedly foisting a false case under the Prevention of Corruption Act against the officer in collusion with the businessman.
The court ordered that Amandeep Kaur and Rajinder Singh alias Gopi, who were out on bail, be taken into custody.
Complainant Manjit Kaur, wife of the deceased ETO, stated that the accused had entered into a criminal conspiracy to falsely implicate her husband in a corruption case and fabricate evidence in order to extort money from him.
According to the complaint, Amandeep Kaur, then SP Vigilance; havildar Harminder Singh; businessmen Rajinder Singh Gopi, Rajiv Sood, Paramjit Singh; and others allegedly staged a fake trap operation against Ranjit Singh on March 29, 2011, around 5 pm near Phase 2, SAS Nagar (Mohali). A false FIR was subsequently registered at Police Station Vigilance Bureau, Flying Squad-1, Punjab, Mohali, under Sections 7, 8, and 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.
It was alleged that Rs 8 lakh and later Rs 50 lakh were demanded from Ranjit Singh, who was continuously pressured and harassed, eventually leading him to commit suicide at his residence on April 22, 2011.
The Punjab Government constituted a committee on April 29, 2011, which concluded that Amandeep Kaur had acted solely on the complaint of Rajinder Singh Gopi, apparently to provide personal benefit to him. The committee further observed that instead of checking corruption, Amandeep Kaur and her reader, Harminder Singh, had themselves indulged in bribery during the investigation by forcibly obtaining Rs 8 lakh from the late officer under duress.
The committee also found that an additional Rs 50 lakh was demanded from Ranjit Singh by threatening him with further criminal accusations. It recommended the registration of an FIR against Amandeep Kaur and her reader Harminder Singh under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
Further, the committee concluded that Rajinder Singh Gopi had orchestrated the false case against Ranjit Singh with the motive of intimidating taxation officers so that goods could pass through the tax department without payment of taxes.
The committee clearly stated that Ranjit Singh had no intention of accepting a bribe in the case. Regarding the cause of his death, the committee observed that the false corruption case, forcible extortion of Rs 8 lakh by Amandeep Kaur and Harminder Singh, the subsequent demand of Rs 50 lakh, threats of additional criminal cases, and the humiliation suffered at the hands of the accused collectively drove him to suicide.