Assam Education Minister arrested on graft charges

New Delhi, June 3 : Assam's Education Minister Ripun Borah was on Tuesday arrested by the CBI for allegedly offering a bribe of ten lakh rupees to an agency official.

Borah is a suspect in murder of his political rival Daniel Toppo in 2000. The CBI official, probing the murder of the student leader Toppo, filed a complaint last evening that the Minister had allegedly offered him a bribe to hush up the case.

He was arrested from Mathura Road in south Delhi when he was allegedly offering the bribe to the official. The CBI registered a case of criminal conspiracy and one under Prevention of Corruption Act against him. Toppo, district president of All Assam Tea Tribe Students Union, was Borah's rival candidate during the 1996 Assembly polls.

The CBI was handed over the investigation into the case in 2001 after the Assam Police could not make any breakthrough into the murder that took place on September 27, 2000.

ANI