Patna, Jan. 20: An IPS officer and four deputy superintendents of police, earlier posted at Muzaffarpur, have come under the scanner of the vigilance investigation bureau, assigned to probe into alleged financial irregularities worth Rs 71 crore.

While the IPS officer in question, Ratan Sanjay, is at present posted with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the four DSPs, Dheeraj Kumar, Arvind Kumar Gupta, Shanker Jha and Manish Kumar, are posted in different districts. Manish is at present posted as DSP (headquarters) in Muzaffarpur.

Special vigilance court judge (Muzaffarpur) Arun Kumar Singh today issued a directive to the vigilance investigation bureau headquarters in Patna, asking to conduct a through investigation into the case, which was earlier probed by the district police.

The court took strong exception to the alleged lackadaisical attitude of the investigating officer as most of the accused were public servants. “All the police officials irrespective of posts should be brought under the ambit of the investigation,” the court observed.

The court further said: “The onus lies on all these senior police officials whose negligence led to excess withdrawal of money from the treasury.” The court expressed surprise over chargesheets submitted in the court against only five out of the eight named accused in the case. The chargesheets were submitted against Sushil Kumar Choudhary (head clerk posted in the SP’s office), Shakuntala Devi and Baby Kumari (woman constables), Indu Shekher and Anita Choudhary.

The investigating officer, however, failed to submit chargesheet against three named accused, Rajiv Ranjan, Dinesh Prasad and Pankaj Kumar, in spite of enough evidence against them. “It seems that investigation is not being carried out in a proper manner,” the court said.

Sources said a sum of Rs 1.62 crore was withdrawn from the Muzaffarpur district treasury by furnishing the signature by Ratan Sanjay, who was posted as superintendent of police. Similarly, Dheeraj Kumar’s signature was used to withdraw Rs 34.10 crore, Manish Kumar’s signature to withdraw Rs 3.24 crore, Arvind Kumar Gupta’s signature to withdraw Rs 9.41 crore and Shanker Jha’s signature was used to withdraw Rs 22.20 crore respectively. The DSPs happens to be the treasury officers. The money for the payment of salary and other allowances is withdrawn by the designated treasury offices.

The money was withdrawn during financial year 2006-07, sources said. The police had seized Rs 80 lakh from the houses of Shakuntala and Baby during a raid on October 2 last year. The alleged kingpin of the racket, Sushil Kumar Choudhary, was arrested on the directive of incumbent Muzaffarpur SSP Sunil Kumar.