Puneet Gupta, son-in-law of ex-Chhattisgarh CM Raman Singh, charged for Rs 50 crore fraud

Puneet Gupta, son-in-law of former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister and BJP vice president Raman Singh, was on Friday charged for Rs 50 crore fraud, police said. Gupta has allegedly committed financial irregularities worth Rs 50 crore during his tenure as the superintendent of a state-run DKS hospital in Raipur.

Raipur Additional Superintendent of Police Prafull Thakur told news agency PTI that the son-in-law of the former Chhattisgarh CM was charged for forgery and cheating following a complaint by incumbent superintendent of DKS Hospital, Kamal Kishore Sahare.

In his complaint, Sahare alleged that the BJP leader’s son-in-law committed financial irregularities during his tenure and caused massive loss to the state exchequer. The Raipur ASP said that the state government had received multiple complaints about illegal appointments in the hospital. The government constituted a committee to probe the allegations. The committee found that Gupta had misused his position and committed fraud of Rs 50 crore.

Gupta was booked under section 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant), 420 (cheating), 467 (forgery of valuable security), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.

Thakur said that a further investigation in the case was still on and other accused, whose names were not mentioned in the complaint, are also part of the probe. In February, Gupta had resigned from the service after a case was registered against him for alleged fixing of the Antagarh assembly bypoll held in 2014 during Raman Singh’s government.

The case against the son-in-law of the top BJP leader has come as a big embarrassment for the saffron party, which accuses Robert Vadra, son-in-law of UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, of corruption and scam.

(With inputs from agencies.)