The Indian Express ·
Tahsildar skips Ganesha event preparation for Rs 50 lakh bribe, trapped by Lokayukta
Lokayukta officials caught Dharwad Tahsildar Sacchidanand Kuchanoor red-handed accepting a Rs 50 lakh bribe from a landowner.
In one of the major Lokayukta traps in Karnataka, officials caught the Dharwad tahsildar late Wednesday night while he accepted a Rs 50 lakh bribe from a landowner to declare 13 acres unfit for farming.
Lokayukta officials arrested Sacchidanand Kuchanoor around 9.30 pm as he accepted the cash. They produced him before a magistrate and remanded him to judicial custody. According to a Lokayukta police officer, the complainant, who owned 33 acres of land, approached the department seeking approval to declare 13 acres unsuitable for farming to facilitate the formation of a residential layout. Kuchanoor allegedly demanded Rs 1 crore in cash and one acre of land to execute the approval.
The landowner filed a complaint with the Lokayukta police on Wednesday afternoon. Officials hatched a plan and directed the victim to meet the officer at 5.30 pm, but Kuchanoor was unavailable.
The land in question is situated in Yerikoppa village, 12 km off Dharwad along the Pune-Bengaluru highway. While land prices were Rs 30 lakh to Rs 40 lakh per acre a decade ago, proximity to institutions like IIT Dharwad and the Karnataka High Court (Dharwad bench) pushed rates to approximately Rs 1.5 crore per acre. Officials noted the 13-acre plot slated for approval is worth nearly Rs 15 crore, and Kuchanoor sought a direct share of its value.
On Thursday, Kuchanoor organised a Ganesha festival, Satya Narayana pooja, and a ritual feast near the tahsildar office. He spent much of Wednesday managing event arrangements and paying advance money to cooks and workers.
When the victim repeatedly insisted that holding such a large sum of cash was risky, Kuchanoor briefly left the event preparations around 8.30 pm and instructed the victim to meet him near Karnataka Arts College, Dharwad.
Kuchanoor arrived in his car around 9.30 pm to collect the cash. Lokayukta officers moved in and arrested him immediately upon receiving the money.
Officials seized the cash at the scene. “He cried, begged us to let him go, offered us cash, and promised he would remain indebted for life,” a Lokayukta officer said.
In a separate development, Upa Lokayukta Justice B Veerappa registered a suo motu case against the Mandya district health and family welfare officer and doctors at the Arakere village primary health centre for holding a politician’s birthday celebration on the medical campus.
The action follows an August 21 event where health officials held the birthday celebrations of former MLA Vijayalakshmi Bandisiddegowda, mother of sitting MLA Ramesh Babu Bandisiddegowda, at the Arakere health centre in front of media personnel. Reports indicated that a doctor’s chamber in the paediatrics department was handed over to women theatre artists to use as a makeup room, and videos later circulated widely on social media.
Following a report submitted by the Mandya district Lokayukta on September 5, Justice Veerappa registered the case on September 9. The next hearing before the Upa Lokayukta is scheduled for October 5.
