ACB raids residences, offices of 8 govt officials in Karnataka

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of Karnataka on Friday raided the houses and offices of eight state government officials across the state.

"The surprise raids were conducted in Bengaluru, Bidar, South Canara, Haveri, Raichur and Chikballapur districts," said the ACB.

Additional Director General of Police N.S. Megharikh and Inspector General K.V. Sharath Chandra of the watchdog supervised the searches in all the seven districts.

The officials under the scanner are K.T. Halaswamy, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Transport, Bengaluru, Dr. Kumar Gowda, Principal of Health Department Training Centre, Mulbagal,A Sahadeva Bheemrao Manakere, assistant engineer, Gulbarga Electricity Supply Company (Gescom), Kalaburagi, AS.P. Thippa Reddy, assistant engineer, Karnataka Renewable Energy Development Ltd, Chikmagalur, Venkataramanappa, hostel warden, Social Welfare Department, Chikballapura, R. Vijayakumar Gudigeri, Revenue Inspector, Haveri, Basavaraj Rudrappa Goudar, assistant executive engineer, Panchayat Raj Department, Raichur, Bannappa Komar, assistant executive engineer, Krishna Jala Bhagya Limited, Raichur.

"The searches were conducted on credible information that the accused officials were having assets disproportionate to their legal income," said the Bureau.

The officials were found to possess huge properties, including farmlands, residential and commercial sites, buildings, gold jewellery and silver ornaments, unaccounted cash, cars, bank deposits, lockers and foreign currency, besides incriminating documents in support of the graft charges. - IANS