Top State Official Held for Bribery

A top officer in the Maharashtra government found himself embroiled in both a bribery and a disproportionate assets case on Thursday.

Madhav Vishwanath Domkondkar, 57, a secretary of the Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran (water supply department), was arrested by the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) for accepting a bribe of Rs 50,000 from a government contractor. But a bigger shock was in store when ACB officers searched Domkondkar's Malabar Hill apartment and discovered assets worth nearly Rs 2 crore in his possession.

The ACB charged Domkondkar with accepting a bribe as also holding disproportionate assets. In his apartment they discovered he had Rs 11.8 lakh in cash, 22 accounts in various banks, four fixed deposits worth Rs 1 lakh each, flats in Thane and Borivli, a bungalow in Nanded, a hotel worth Rs 25 lakh in Devgiri, two non-agricultural plots worth Rs 22 lakh each, Rs 1.53 lakh in the SBI Walkeshwar branch and many expensive household goods. The authorities are still calculating the total value of the assets.

Domkondkar lives in the posh Ambar apartments at Malabar Hill, where most of the state's top police officers, including director-general of police P S Pasricha, also reside. He became the third person from the same department to be arrested in connection with the same contractor in the past two years. His arrest is the biggest one of a state official since former director-general of police (housing) Rahul Gopal was arrested in connection with graft in 2005.

The government contractor who led the ACB to Domkondkar is carrying out a Rs 16-crore project at the Amba river in Raigad district whose aim it is to supply water to 44 villages. The contractor has been carrying out the work since 2004 and has so far completed Rs 12 crore worth of work. The contractor had filed two cases—one in an Alibaug court and another in the Bombay High Court—with respect to the non-clearance of bills and work had come to a standstill. In between, Domkondkar had allegedly approached the contractor and demanded Rs 5 lakh in exchange for not cancelling the remainder of his contract.

Tired of Domkondkar's demands, the contractor approached the ACB and lodged a complaint. Domkondkar was allegedly caught red-handed accepting Rs 50,000 as the first installment in the bribe of Rs 5 lakh, said additional superintendent of police (ACB) Vilas Tupe.

Incidentally, the ACB team first sent uniformed officers and not plainclothes men to Domkondkar's residence because plainclothes men would have had to complete several formalities before entering the premises, which is guarded by many other policemen as the building houses several top IPS officers. The uniformed men gained entry by saying they had come to meet an IPS officer. In this manner, Domkondkar was not alerted beforehand.

ACB sources said additional commissioner (ACB) Pradyna Sarvade was instrumental in carrying out the operation against such a senior officer.

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