A 67-year-old retired Assistant Director General of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has been sentenced to three years in jail along with Rs 75 lakh fine by a Delhi court in a 17-year-old case for possessing disproportionate assets of over Rs 13 lakh.
The court held guilty Vishwa Vibhuti, who was working as Assistant Director General in the ministry's Government Medical Store Department (GMSD), for amassing assets of over Rs 72 lakh in his and his family members' names in 1996 though his known income was Rs 58,17,998.
While awarding the jail term to the convict, Special CBI Judge Dinesh Kumar Sharma said corruption in any form and of any quantum should be punished severely so that a message must go that "corruption should never be a profitable business".
"If the corrupt people are let off lightly, honest public servants also get discouraged and demoralised. Now a days, corruption not only creates imbalance in the society, it also obstructs the development of a nation as a whole.
"The convict before this court joined government service as a Class I officer. He was in the Medical Store Department and while being in the government job, he accumulated wealth which has proved to be disproportionate to his known sources of income," the court said.
The judge observed that "this case becomes more sensitive in view of the fact that convict (Vibhuti) was given a pious duty of acquiring medicines for the government hospitals and acquisition of wealth by indulging in corrupt practices in such a job is very serious."
The court, however, allowed Vibhuti's plea and suspended his sentence till December 12 on furnishing a bail bond of Rs five lakh and two sureties of like amount with a condition for not to leave the country.
A case was registered by CBI against Vibhuti on May 15, 1996 on the allegations that while functioning as a public servant in the capacity of ADG, GMSD at Hyderabad and Delhi between June 1985 to March 1995, he accumulated huge movable and immovable assets worth Rs 72,68,258 in his and family members' names.
