6-year jail term for Income Tax officer for Rs 15,000 bribe 23 years ago

The officer was the deputy commissioner of the Income Tax department in Lucknow, when the bribery case was filed against him.

A 1989 batch IRS (Indian Revenue Services) officer was sentenced to six years’ imprisonment by a trial court in Uttar Pradesh’s Lucknow for taking a bribe of Rs 15,000 23 years ago. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 1.5 lakh on the officer.

On November 29, 1999, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had filed a case against Arvind Mishra, who was then the deputy commissioner of the Income Tax department in Lucknow, after a man alleged Mishra demanded a bribe of Rs 20,000 for issuing a ‘no dues certificate’ to him in the prescribed format 34 (A).

The next day, the CBI laid a trap and caught Mishra red-handed when he was accepting a bribe of Rs 15,000 from the complainant.

After investigation, a charge-sheet was filed against Mishra in the Court of Special Judge, CBI Cases, Lucknow.

“In this case, the trial was stayed for most of the time as different petitions were pending in the matter before the High Court. The petitions filed by the accused were adequately countered by the CBI prosecutors. The CBI was successful in convincing both the trial court and the High Court about the merits of the prosecution’s case...following which the petitions of the accused were rejected and the interim relief in favour of the accused was also waived,” said R C Joshi, a spokesperson of the CBI.

Based on the evidence presented by the CBI, the trial court found Mishra guilty and convicted him on the charge of taking bribe on Monday.