Micromax owner, top exec collared for attempted bribery
08 Aug 2013
The Central Bureau of Investigation on Wednesday arrested the owner of mobile phone maker Micromax as well as a senior company executive for allegedly attempting to bribe Delhi municipal officers to obtain clearance for the construction of a banquet hall.
Micromax, which started as an IT software company in 2000, entered the highly competitive mobile handset market in 2008 and is today ranked the 12th largest handset manufacturer in the world with a range ofd 60 handset models. It has a 24-per cent market share in the smartphone segment in India.
Along with Rajesh Agrawal owner of Micromax Informatics, and company executive Manish Tuli, the CBI also arrested two junior officials of the municipal corporation and carried out searches at 15 locations, including residential and official premises of the Muncipal Corporation of Delhi officers.
Investigators said they got a tip-off that Agrawal and Tuli had struck a deal with the engineers of the civic body to get clearance for construction of their banquet hall in Wazirpur area of north Delhi for a kickback of Rs50 lakh, which was later bargained down to Rs30 lakh.
Soon after getting the tip-off that the bribe is to be paid at the Timarpur office of Agrawal and Tuli, a CBI team landed at the spot, and allegedly caught Tuli and Agrawal handing over the money to junior officials of the MCD, who were actually bagmen for a superintendent engineer and an executive engineer.
After catching Agrawal, Tuli and two MCD officials "red-handed", CBI teams carried out searches at 15 locations including the residential and official premises of the MCD officers, they said.
The search teams recovered Rs40 lakh in cash from the residence of an MCD Junior Engineer, Kapil Dev.
The searches are continuing and the agency is on the trail of other MCD officials.
CBI spokesperson Dharini Mishra, while confirming the arrests, said that as soon as they learnt that the money was going to be paid at the Timarpur office of Aggarwal and Tuli, a team rushed to the spot. ldars.
Nobody from Micromax could be reached by the media for comments..
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