CBI indicts road transport institute chief, 2 aides

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday filed a chargesheet before a city court against nine suspects in a forgery case involving testing of plywood used for flooring of 90 buses by the Pune-based Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT).

The chargesheet was filed against CIRT director A Balasubramanian and its two officers, five officers of Ashok Leyland Ltd and director of Pragati High-Tech Products, Vivek Gupta. The chargesheet was filed by the agency’s lawyers, Vivek Saxena and Ayub Pathan.

Ashok Leyland was supposed to supply samples to Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) before the Commonwealth Games and these were sent to CIRT for tests prior to the supply.

The two officers of CIRT are technical director Medha Hemant Bavdekar and head of engineering division, Deepika Anil Nande.

The five officers of Ashok Leyland Ltd are deputy manager Ved Prakash Gautam (37), Ashok Kumar Chopra (52), Vikas Sharma (42), Vinay Bharadwaj (52) and Achyut Medhekar (56).

The CBI alleged that a CIRT scientist, Vitthal Dhondiram Chavan, was pressurised by Bavdekar, Balasubramanian and Nande to conduct the fire retardant test on plywood samples received without stickers of DTC.

Chavan wanted to conduct the test of plywood samples with DTC stickers.

The CBI did not file charges against Chavan as it was determined he played no role in the criminal conspiracy.

The investigation disclosed that 63 non-AC buses were handed over to DTC, but these were brought back to Ashok Leyland after
complaints by DTC of inferior quality material.