Madhepura DM in custody

Patna, Oct 14: District magistrate of Madhepura Hemchandra Jha was arrested by sleuths of state vigilance bureau today after recovery of huge amount of cash from his possession.

State additional DGP (vigilance) Nilmani said that an amount of Rs. 1,90,200 was recovered from the car of Mr Jha during a check at Malsalami police station area here.Vigilance bureau had prior reports of Mr Jha's journey to Patna carrying the cash allegedly collected from some block officers and employees, he claimed.

Simultaneous raids were on in search of more cash, valuables and property related documents at his official residence at Madhepura and private house at Rajivnagar locality of Patna, Mr Nilmani maintained.

Meanwhile district president of Nationalist Congress Party, Angad Yadav has filed a petiion in the court of chief judicial magistrate at Madhepura K P Sahay accusing district magistrate Mr Jha of drawing an amount of nearly five lakhs rupees on the basis of fraudulent and forged papers out of special funds allocated for holding a health awareness fair from January 29-31, 2006, a report from Madhepura said.

UNI