Three employees of Revenue Department here and another official who has retired have been booked for allegedly cheating Maharashtra Government and committing criminal breach of trust, police said today.
All four happen to be senior leaders of the Revenue Employees Union of Yavatmal. Three of them were put under suspension yesterday, while the fourth one retired from service two years ago, officials said.
The action came on a police complaint lodged by the Tehsildar of Yavatmal on June 10 on order from District Collector Sachindra Pratap Singh.
The employees were identified as President of the Union Gajanan Takey, Secretary Nandkmar Bute, Treasurer Ashok Katiyarmal and Ravindra Deshmukh, also an office-bearer. Takey, Bute and Katiyarmal have been suspended, while Deshmukh has retired.
The four were booked under IPC Sections related to cheating, criminal breach of trust and acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention, among others, police said.
The case relates to allotment of premises in the department to the union to run a canteen and a photocopy centre in 1989 by the then Collector.
According to the complaint, the union leaders rented out these premises belonging to the State Government to third parties and collected the monthly rent from them regularly.
However, the union leaders have denied the charges levelled against them.
Addressing a press conference here yesterday, Deshmukh said there was no truth in the allegations and claimed a senior officer in the department was behind the complaint.
After the complaint was filed, Deshmukh had approached the Bombay High Court's Nagpur Bench for anticipatory bail. Acting on the plea, the court had asked Yavatmal police not to take any coercive step against him till the application is disposed of. The next hearing is fixed on July 20.
Meanwhile, the union has decided to launch an indefinite strike probably from Monday (June 29) to protest against the District Collector over the complaint against them.
