NASHIK, May 12: The court of inquiry investigating the job racket at the Artillery Centre (AC), Nashik, has indicted about a dozen army officers and jawans and recommended a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the recruitment of soldiers by the AC.

The court of inquiry which submitted its report to the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Maharashtra and Gujarat region, recently, discovered the prima facie involvement of at least six army officers (a Colonel, four Lieutenant Colonels and a Major), two Junior Commissioned Officers (JCOs), two clerks and a cable operator, in the job racket.

It was discovered that a large number of answer-sheets of candidates had been tampered with to enable them to pass the written examination. It was also found that the AC, which is primarily required to recruit sons of serving, retired or dead soldiers on a priority basis, had `favoured' general candidates. The investigating officer has sought a CBI probe into the affair, as the scope of the court of inquiry had certain procedural limitations. Army officials, requesting anonymity, pointed out that the court of inquiry had found only the tip of the iceberg and only a CBI probe would bring the guilty to book, especially those in higher ranks.

The court of inquiry had been ordered in January 1997, when a Naik Subedar Subhash Khushwa was accused by a civilian of accepting a bribe of Rs 20,000. Later, Rs 1.42 lakh were seized from Khushwa, as a vigil on his house revealed that even serving jawans were approaching him for getting their relatives enrolled in the Artillery.

Four jawans confessed to the court of having paid Khushwa for enrollment of their relatives. Khushwa was being helped in his task by Naik Prem Sagar (helper of Lt Col N K Mehta) and Naik Pritam Singh (helper of Brig Rajesh Kumar Khanna, the enrolling officer and Commandant, AC), who used to find potential candidates, besides a cable operator, Srinivasan.

As soon as the inquiry began, Lt Col Mehta (who was on the selection panel) was certified as a psychopathic case by the doctor of the panel, Lt Col Shukla, and was admitted to the Southern Command hospital at Pune.

Khushwa and the two Naiks, who had confessed to the crime, later accused the court of obtaining their statements under duress.

The officer who investigated the case is facing an inquiry (based on complaints filed by the prime accused) while the officer who recovered Rs 1.42 lakh from the house of the prime accused has been transferred to Faridkot. It is learnt that the investigating officer wrote in his report that senior officials were intimidating him to hush up the case and that they made attempts to doctor his report.

Interestingly, the AC recruits six batches (each comprising about 250) of soldiers in a year and there are separate selection panels on each occasion, the only exception being the Commandant, AC, Brig Rajesh Khanna. The AC had been embroiled in similar controversy two years ago, when a court of inquiry had been ordered following reports of irregularities from the military intelligence.

The probe began with a Colonel being appointed to investigate. The inquiry was handed over to a Brigadier and later to a Major General. The inquiry officer, Major General Deepak Verma (School of Artillery, Deolali) has been transferred to Delhi as Major General (Movements) in the headquarters. Last week, before leaving he submitted his report. The contents of this report are not yet known.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.