Kotwal Sanjana Mane and Circle Officer Poonam Gavit were caught accepting a bribe of ₹20,000 in Rajapur (Ratnagiri district)

Action by the Ratnagiri Anti-Corruption Bureau!

Rajapur – The Anti-Corruption Bureau caught Sanjana Mane, a taluka kotwal (a junior employee in the revenue department), and Poonam Gavit, a circle officer, for demanding a bribe of Rs 25,000 and accepting Rs 20,000 after negotiations, to add the name of the complainant’s wife on the 7/12 records.

1. The complainant has a ancestral land near Mouje. He wanted to add his wife’s name in the 7/12 records and had applied for necessary modifications. On May 13 Kotwal Sanjana Nandkumar Mane in Talathi’s office at Miland demanded Rs 25,000/- from him stating that the Mandal officer Poonam Jasasingh Gavit had demanded the same for approval of the changes.

2. After the complainant lodged a complaint with the Anti-Corruption Bureau, a verification conducted on 14 May revealed that Kotwal Mane had demanded a bribe of ₹20,000 on behalf of Circle Officer Gavit and had agreed to accept it. Accordingly, a trap was laid.

3. At the Miland Talathi office, Kotwal Sanjana Mane accepted ₹20,000 in the presence of panch witnesses. Thereafter, when Circle Officer Poonam Gavit was informed about it over the phone, she expressed her consent to the same. Following this, the Anti-Corruption Bureau team took both of them into custody.

Editorial Perspective

• This incident shows that women competing shoulder to shoulder with men in every field are not lagging behind even in matters of corruption!
• Only if such corrupt officials are dismissed from service and their properties confiscated will there be at least some curb on corruption and an improvement in the functioning of the administration.