‘Achaar’, ‘Mata ka prasad’ – how CBI personnel, others used code language for bribes in Madhya Pradesh nursing college scam

In February this year, the CBI gave a clean chit to 169 nursing colleges in the state. However, on May 18, the CBI filed an FIR against 23 people, including four of its own officers as well as nursing college officials from at least four districts.

In the FIR, it was alleged that the accused persons were involved in the exchange of bribes for facilitating ‘suitability reports’ to ineligible colleges.

On July 15, the CBI filed a chargesheet before a special CBI judge against 14 individuals, including former CBI inspector Rahul Raj, and Sushil Kumar Majoka, a Madhya Pradesh police officer attached with the CBI, as well as directors and other employees of nursing colleges.

The chargesheet was filed under criminal conspiracy charges as well as several sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. Sanction to prosecute Raj and Majoka is awaited. The two CBI personnel were entrusted with inspecting a total of 27 nursing colleges.

The CBI chargesheet alleged that Raj was apprehended while “demanding/accepting illegal gratification of Rs 10 lakh” and that there were “several other incidents wherein the accused obtained bribes” in exchange for sharing with college authorities the schedule of inspection by the CBI team that was looking into alleged irregularities in the functioning of these colleges.

After the inspection schedule was shared, the owners or employees of these nursing colleges would allegedly arrange faculty from “their own or other nursing colleges” and set up labs and other infrastructure to meet the eligibility criteria. In some cases, this was done just two-three days prior to the inspection, or even on the date of inspection, the CBI alleged.

The chargesheet also alleged that Raj and his co-conspirators had developed code words for bribe amounts, inspection reports, and even names of cities “in order to evade detection” of bribe transactions and “surveillance mechanisms”.

According to the chargesheet, the CBI is relying on the transcripts of 658 intercepted phone calls that contain the voices of the accused persons.

On May 7 this year, one of the accused, a community health officer named Radha Raman Sharma, travelled from Ratlam to Jaipur with large sums of money that was given the code name “achar”, the CBI alleged.

Radha is the brother of another accused, Jugal Kishore Sharma, a director at Bhaskar Nursing College in Gwalior. The CBI alleged that Jugal Kishore had told a relative that Radha was coming with a “bhari dibba of achar (a heavy box of achar)” and instructed the relative to keep the money at his house, the chargesheet said.

Jugal Kishore also allegedly instructed this relative that if he received a phone call asking “gulkand aa gaya kya (has the gulkand arrived)”, then he should hand over the money.

According to the CBI chargesheet, “gulkand” was the code for the “bribe amount that was to be delivered”.

On May 10, six coded messages were exchanged between the wife of another CBI inspector and the CEO of a company in Indore regarding turning some of the alleged bribe money into gold bars. “Sir Khodiyar Mata ka prasad mil gya kya (Have you got Khodiyar Mata’s prasad)?” the inspector’s wife asked the CEO, according to the CBI, revealing another alleged coded term for bribe money – “Mata ka prasad”. The CBI alleged that the businessman converted the bribes into four gold bars weighing 100 grams.

The CBI alleged that on May 12, another accused who owns six nursing colleges, instructed an employee to visit Ujjain with Rs 9 lakh. This employee made contact with Radha, who “asked him to send the saman (cash)”. Once this delivery was made, Radha informed Jugal Kishore that he had received “9 dibba achar (9 boxes of achar – Rs 9 lakh in cash)”. According to the CBI, this amount was later transferred to Jaipur and received by Dharmapal, also an accused and an associate of the former CBI inspector Raj.

On May 18, a CBI team camped out at an apartment located in Bhopal’s Professors Colony in a disguised manner after getting information that Rs 10 lakh would be delivered to Raj.

At around 4.10 pm, the CBI team knocked on the door of Raj’s house. After repeated knocking, Raj opened the door and the team found the chairman of a nursing college and his wife inside. The agency alleged that they were there to hand over the bribe.

According to the chargesheet, the chairman and wife told the CBI team that they “visited the premises to deliver the bribe amount”, which Raj “accepted…and kept with him for a while”. The nursing college chairman was allegedly told by Raj “to keep the money swiftly back in his backpack” after the CBI team knocked on the door.

While the legal teams for Raj and other accused refused to comment on the CBI allegations, advocate Deepesh Joshi, who represents Jugal Kishore and Radha, said: “No offence is made out against my clients under the Prevention of Corruption Act. The 2018 amendments to the Act protects people who are compelled to give a bribe. The CBI has built its case on code words like achar and gulkand, which can’t be proved in court.”