EOW gives clean chit to Digvijaya Singh in admission irregularity case

Former chief minister Digvijaya Singh and an ex-Congress minister among others, have been given a clean chit by the Economic Offences Wing in a 19-year-old case related to alleged irregularities in admitting 12 students to the RKDF Institute of Science and Technology, Bhopal.

Director General (EOW) K N Tiwari said the EOW has filed a closure report in the case as they could not find any evidence of wrong doing.

EOW officials said the case deals with alleged irregularities in giving admission to 12 students in 2000-01 and 2001-02 academic sessions by the RKDF college authorities, for which the technical education department had imposed a penalty of ₹24 lakhs on the college. This was initially approved by the then chief minister Digvijaya Singh, who was CM from 1993-2003.

The college authorities asked for a reduction in the penalty amount to ₹5 lakhs. However, the then technical education minister Raja Pateria sent another file to the CM asking for a reduction of amount to ₹2.50 lakh which was approved by the then CM thereby causing a loss of ₹21.50 lakh to the exchequer.

The EOW had also allegedly found that a forged letter was sent to the Rajiv Gandhi Technical University regularizing the admission of the students.

In December 2015, the EOW had registered cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and the IPC against Digvijaya Singh, former technical education minister Raja Pateria and chairman of the RKDF education society Sunil Kapoor.

EOW officials said that in their closure report it is stated that the then principal of the college has expired and his statement was crucial to the investigation. The officials also did not find the list of 12 students in the college records, who had allegedly been given wrongful admission. Also, under the business rules the chief minister has the power to reduce or waive off fees of any student and hence no irregularity was committed in waiving off the fees.