Patna, June 30: A special vigilance court today ordered confiscation of former state Rajbhasha director Dhruv Narayan Choudhary’s disproportionate assets worth Rs 4.21 crore if he does not surrender the property within a month.

Special vigilance judge R.C. Mishra ordered confiscation of the disproportionate assets of Choudhary, wife Kaushalya Devi, sons Ashok Kumar Lal and Dipak Kumar Lal and their wives Poonam Singh and Sarita, alias Annu, respectively. The judge asked them to hand over the property accumulated disproportionate to their known resources of income to the district magistrates concerned within a month.

“If the accused (persons) fail to do so within the stipulated period, the district magistrate concerned will be empowered to initiate the process of confiscation of their disproportionate assets,” the judge said while disposing of a petition filed by a special vigilance unit official.

The former state Rajbhasha director was charged with amassing unaccounted wealth and suspended in 2008 and is the seventh public servant in Bihar against whom an order of confiscation of disproportionate assets has been issued by the vigilance court under the Bihar Special Courts Act, 2009. The Act empowers court to confiscate disproportionate assets of an accused even before the accused is held guilty in cases lodged under Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. The Rajbhasha department’s primary responsibility is to implement the official language policy of the Union in central government offices, undertakings, corporations, banks, boards and insurance companies. It chalks out various programmes to publicise and propagate the official language — Hindi — in government offices and public sector organisations and works as a nodal agency to ensure proper use of the official language in areas falling under its jurisdiction.

The special vigilance unit set up by the Nitish Kumar government in 2006 for tightening noose around corrupt public servants had filed a petition in the court on December 2, 2010, seeking confiscation of Choudhary’s property disproportionate to the known sources of income under Section 13 of Bihar Special Courts Act.

The vigilance unit had lodged a disproportionate assets case against Choudhary on April 26, 2008.

Subsequently, simultaneous searches were carried out at his office and residential premises in Bettiah (West Champaran), Muzaffarpur and Patna on April 27, 2008.

A search was also carried out at Ashok’s house at Vikramanagar in Varanasi on April 29, 2008. Sources said the vigilance sleuths had found Rs 1.63 lakh in cash during the search at Choudhary’s Rambagh house in Muzaffarpur.

The team also found Rs 1.55 crore in the locker of the Central Bank of India’s Saraiyaganj branch in Muzaffarpur. The locker was issued in the name of Dipak and his wife, Annu.

The search of another locker yielded in recovery of Rs 1.48 crore from the same bank. A few counterfeit notes were also seized from the locker.

A case was lodged at Muzaffarpur town police station in connection with the seizure of the counterfeit notes, a senior special vigilance unit officer said.

The probe by the special vigilance unit revealed that Choudhary and his family members owned six plots of land in Muzaffapur and Patna, besides a flat at Kanak Braj Raj Apartment on Boring road in the state capital.

Besides, Choudhary had made huge investments in insurance policies, mutual funds and term deposits. Investigation revealed that Choudhary had spent about Rs 24.46 lakh on construction work on a plot in Muzaffarpur.

“The property of Choudhary was assessed with effect from January 1, 1982 to April 27, 2008,” the officer said, adding that Dipak and his wife had furnished forged documents to the bank for getting the second locker issued against their names. The couple had claimed themselves to be residents of Motihari (East Champaran) and Darbhanga districts.

The special vigilance court had earlier issued orders of confiscation of disproportionate assets of former IAS officer S.S. Varma, assistant in Patna collectorate Girish Kumar, former director-general of police Narain Mishra, Gaya Municipal Corporation revenue officer Yogendra Prasad Singh, former Gaya motor vehicles inspector Raghuwansh Kuer and former state drug controller Y.K. Jaiswal. Sources in the vigilance bureau said proceedings of confiscation of disproportionate assets of 45 government officials have been initiated under the Bihar Special Courts Act.

A source said several public servants have purchased flats and land in Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, New Delhi and Bengal with ill-gotten money.