A Delhi police official, who was held guilty of demanding and accepting Rs 10,000 bribe from a person for releasing his impounded car, has been sent to three years in jail by a local court which said his acts have dented thefaithof societyinpoliceanddamaged their reputation.
Special CBI Judge Brijesh Kumar Garg sent Dev Raj, who was Head Constable with Delhi Police in 2013 when the incident of bribery took place, to jail while observing that being in that post he had added responsibility to uphold rule of law.
"Dev Raj was working as Head Constable in Delhi Police and, therefore, was having added responsibility to uphold the rule of law. But his acts have dented the faith of the society at large in the police officials and has damaged the reputation of the Delhi Police as a whole," the judge said.
The court, which also imposed a fine of Rs 15,000 on the convict, said the allegations against him were quite serious.
"In the present case, the allegations proved against the convict are quite serious in nature. The convict (Raj) had abused and misused his official capacity as a police officer and has demanded and accepted Rs 10,000 from complainant as bribe for releasing his car on superdari to him, despite court orders in favour of the complainant," it said, while refusing to take a lenient view towards him.
"Keepinginview,theentirecircumstancesofthepresent case... Iamoftheconsideredopinionthattheconvict does notdeserveanyleniencyfromthiscourt," the judge said.
Raj was convicted for offences under Prevention of Corruption Act for accepting bribe from complainant Narinder Singh in 2013 as a favour to release his car which was being driven by his friend when it was impounded in a traffic violation case.
The court, while holding Raj guilty, had relied on the electronic evidence and testimonies of the complainant as well as CBI officers who had laid a trap to catch him.
According to prosecution, on August 20, 2013,Singh's car was impounded by traffic police and was deposited at Kanjhawalapolice station here after a quarrel had taken place between his friend and police.
In his complaint, lodged on September 2, 2013, Singh alleged that whenhemetRajinthe policestation,hewas asked to bring money to get the car released.
Singh then approached the CBI officials who laid a trap to catch the accused policeman.
During the trial, the Head Constable had denied the allegations and contended that he was falsely implicated.
