Delhi High Court Prosecutes DPS CGHS Sampathkumar Gang Embezzlement Case
Delhi High Court Prosecutes DPS CGHS Sampathkumar Gang Embezzlement Case
By Rakesh Raman
Court Case of Delhi Public School Cooperative Group Housing Society (DPS CGHS or DPS Housing Society), Plot No. 16, Sector 4, Dwarka, New Delhi 110 078
Note: This case is part of the “Clean House” anti-corruption social service that I have been running for the past 7 years to report about crime and corruption in Delhi’s cooperative group housing societies (CGHS).
You can click here to know the process and file your complaint at the “Clean House” service.
Update: September 11, 2024
The DPS CGHS is one of the most corrupt housing societies in Delhi. The crimes at DPS CGHS are committed by a number of past and present management committee (MC) members led by a Sampathkumar (details given below) who acts like a gang leader.
The present case of embezzlement at DPS CGHS is being prosecuted at Delhi High Court. The misappropriation of public money in this case is currently estimated to be more than one crore rupees, although it started with nearly Rs. 44 lakh a few years ago (document given below).
It is learnt that the DPS CGHS MC is trying to allure the petitioner who has filed the case so that the Delhi High Court case could be withdrawn. However, this legal case cannot be brushed under the carpet until the allegedly embezzled money of more than one crore rupees is recovered and deposited in the DPS CGHS account. I am in the process of pursuing this case, while the next date of hearing is December 18, 2024.
Along with DPS CGHS MC, the Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS) of Delhi Government is also respondent in this case at Delhi High Court. The corrupt RCS officials have been colluding with DPS CGHS MC members in various cases of crime and corruption.
In September 2020, Pankaj Kumar, IAS, was appointed by the RCS office to conduct an investigation under Section 61 of DCS Act, 2003 into the estimated Rs. 20-crore corruption scandal of DPS CGHS where Sampathkumar and his accomplices operate.
But apparently Pankaj Kumar was bribed by Sampathkumar or his accomplices to get a favourable investigation report which was submitted dishonestly without taking my inputs, as I was the main complainant.
Since Pankaj Kumar had filed a dubious report to unscrupulously exonerate Sampathkumar and his accomplices, it was clearly a case of corruption under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (PC Act).
In response to the complaints filed by me against Pankaj Kumar, the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Government of India, has directed the Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, to investigate the corruption cases of at least 10 IAS officers including Pankaj Kumar, who colluded with Sampathkumar’s gang to submit a false investigation report in the DPS CGHS corruption scandal.
I received the latest letter in this case from the DoPT last month (August 2024) informing me that the investigation against IAS officers including Pankaj Kumar and Registrars at RCS office is under progress. I am also in the process of approaching other anti-corruption and law-enforcement authorities to get these IAS officers prosecuted and a fresh investigation started into the DPS CGHS corruption scandal.
Similarly, I had filed a corruption complaint at the Supreme Court against judge Manish Khurana who colluded with Sampathkumar’s gang and corrupt Delhi Development Authority (DDA) officials to allow floor area ratio (FAR) construction at DPS CGHS.
The FAR construction at DPS CGHS was declared unauthorized and stopped by DDA in response to the complaints filed by me at the anti-corruption authority Lokpal of India and National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of India. But with his wrongful decision – presumably after taking bribes – judge Manish Khurana ordered the construction to resume at DPS CGHS after about a year.
As my complaint was forwarded to Delhi High Court, I participated in a hearing and explained the corruption case of judge Manish Khurana to the Registrar Vigilance of Delhi High Court.
Since this case was arbitrarily closed by Delhi High Court, I filed an appeal in August 2024 at the anti-corruption authority Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) of India to get the case against judge Manish Khurana and a complicit advocate prosecuted. The CVC informed me recently that it has reopened the case.
Meanwhile, Sampathkumar and his accomplices are terrorizing me with various threats so that I should not write about their crimes in my editorial reports. I am in the process of informing about these threats and their crimes to the authorities.
[ You can click here to know more about crimes at DPS CGHS. ]
The previous reports in this case are given below.
DPS CGHS Embezzlement Case: Secretary Vikas Sharma Appears in Delhi High Court
The case has been filed by the heirs of a deceased DPS CGHS member Savita Jaiswal.
Update: June 2, 2024
The DPS CGHS housing society has been under the control of some of the most corrupt management committee (MC) members for the past about 20 years. Now, the MC members are embroiled in a serious embezzlement case which is being litigated at the High Court of Delhi.
In my article dated April 21, 2024 (reproduced below), I had reported that the Delhi High Court had warned the President and the Secretary of DPS CGHS that if they did not appear personally, the court would issue bailable warrants against them.
Therefore, in the court hearing on May 28, 2024, it is learnt that the DPS CGHS Secretary Vikas Sharma appeared in the court. The next date of court hearing is September 9, 2024.
The previous report about DPS CGHS embezzlement case is reproduced below.
Update: April 21, 2024
Delhi High Court Warns DPS CGHS MC Members of Bailable Warrants
In an ongoing legal case, the High Court of Delhi has said that it will issue bailable warrants against the President and the Secretary of DPS CGHS if they did not appear personally in the court.
The case has been filed by the heirs of a deceased DPS CGHS member Savita Jaiswal, as it is alleged that the DPS CGHS management committee (MC) members are not issuing the no-dues certificate to the petitioners.
The petition of Savita Jaiswal through her heirs seeks the court direction for the DPS CGHS MC to intimate the outstanding dues and issue the no-dues certificate to Ms. Jaiswal’s heirs.
However, the DPS CGHS MC is reluctant to issue no-dues certificate because the society records show that lakhs of rupees are supposed to be recovered from Ms. Jaiswal.
In a letter dated July 6, 2019 signed by then DPS CGHS secretary M. N. Sampathkumar (also written as Sampath Kumar), it is alleged that an amount of Rs. 44,34,151 (over Rs. 44 lakh) needs to be recovered from Ms. Jaiswal.
The said letter – which was a show-cause notice to expel Ms. Jaiswal from the membership of the society – also mentions that she will not be allowed to transfer or sell her flat until the full amount is recovered from her.
The DPS CGHS MC – particularly M. N. Sampathkumar – has arbitrarily imposed many other financial penalties on Ms. Jaiswal who was a former president of DPS CGHS. For example, Ms. Jaiswal was asked to pay the legal fee paid to the lawyers for defending legal cases in which Sampathkumar and other MC members are involved.
If you add the interest amount on the money which is claimed to be recoverable from Ms. Jaiswal and other charges such as the building construction money, the total amount that Ms. Jaiswal has to pay may even be close to Rs. one crore.
As the secretary of DPS CGHS, Sampathkumar had also written a letter dated June 21, 2019 to the Divisional Commissioner (Revenue) of Delhi Government against Ms. Jaiswal, alleging that she is not providing the records of the society which may also include the financial records.
However, Ms. Jaiswal had refuted all the allegations levelled against her by Sampathkumar and other MC members. Society records indicate that Sampathkumar was harassing Ms. Jaiswal because she was opposing a dangerous construction project under the floor area ratio (FAR) scheme in the society building that Sampathkumar was imposing on members to extort money from them.
HOSTILE ACTIONS OF SAMPATHKUMAR
Although the DPS CGHS has been largely controlled by highly corrupt MC members, this Sampathkumar has crossed all limits of criminality. In order to extort money from DPS CGHS members for a lethal construction project under the FAR scheme, Sampathkumar terrorized members who opposed his crimes.
Today, Sampathkumar’s name appears as an accused or a convict in all conceivable records of the government. In order to circumvent the law and dodge legal cases against him, it is learnt that Sampathkumar has absconded and is not living in DPS CGHS society.
With his accomplices in DPS CGHS and support from builders’ mafia, Sampathkumar had been running the DPS CGHS affairs as a gang leader and threatening all those members who were raising voice against his criminality.
Sampathkumar’s threats to members include false police complaints, bogus cases to get members expelled from the society, frivolous legal notices in connivance with dishonest lawyers, slanderous attacks on members publicly, and so on.
A number of members succumbed to Sampathkumar’s threats and paid money like protection money for the FAR construction crime that Sampathkumar was leading. He behaved as a serial offender and misused public money of members worth lakhs of rupees to defend the legal cases in which he has been involved. [ You can click here to read the report about Sampathkumar’s crimes along with government documents that name him as an accused or a convict. ]
Along with Sampathkumar, the other MC members who faced investigations for their involvement in crimes are Neeraj Kumar Vaish, R. Balasubramanian, Ms. Leela Swami, Sandeep Taneja, Manguram Tyagi, Ms. Naseem Afshaque, M.M. Shukla, and a slew of others. [ You can click here to read the record of crime and corruption at DPS CGHS since 2017 along with related government documents. ]
As these Sampathkumar gang members who masqueraded as the DPS CGHS MC members were aware that the legal noose is tightening around their necks for the nefarious activities committed by them, they started resigning from their MC positions one by one.
Sampathkumar and his other gang members are so cunning that they threw all their criminal records on a new MC comprising president W.B. Santhosh, secretary Vikas Sharma, and treasurer Ms. Shashi Chouhan.
The apparent objective of Sampathkumar and his accomplices is to make these new MC members responsible for the wrongdoings and the ongoing investigations including Ms. Jaiswal’s Delhi High Court case for which the DPS CGHS president and secretary are warned of bailable warrants.
While it is learnt that the new MC members have quit or are trying to quit to avoid the legal hassles in which they have been pushed by Sampathkumar and his accomplices, the present status of DPS CGHS MC is not known. Since the DPS CGHS MC members run the society operations clandestinely like a criminal enterprise, they do not properly update the society website.
In the Delhi High Court case of Ms. Jaiswal, along with DPS CGHS MC members, the office of the Registrar Cooperative Societies (RCS) of Delhi Government is also a respondent.
The corrupt RCS officials have not been taking action against the DPS CGHS MC members – including Sampathkumar – despite their multiple crimes and conviction in some cases such as the labour rights violation case. [ You can click here to read the DPS CGHS labour rights violation case along with documents. ]
In 2020, in response to a complaint filed by me, the RCS office had appointed District Magistrate Pankaj Kumar (IAS) to investigate the crime and corruption of DPS CGHS MC members including Sampathkumar. But Pankaj Kumar who was apparently bribed by the corrupt DPS CGHS MC members submitted a bogus report to exonerate the accused DPS CGHS MC members.
As a result of his complicity in DPS CGHS corruption case and for filing a fake investigation report, Pankaj Kumar is facing a corruption investigation ordered by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Government of India through the Cabinet Secretariat. I have filed the complaint against Pankaj Kumar to DoPT.
Similarly, I filed a complaint at the Supreme Court against Judge Manish Khurana, who allowed DPS CGHS MC members, including Sampathkumar, to resume illegal FAR construction which was stopped by the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) when I had complained against it to the anti-corruption authority Lokpal and the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of India.
The Supreme Court asked Delhi High Court to investigate the case of Judge Manish Khurana. I appeared in the hearing conducted by Delhi High Court. The investigation is underway.
[ VIDEOS: You can click here to watch a video that shows the damage being caused by FAR construction and you can also click here to watch the video that shows damage done by FAR construction to my home. ]
The police have informed me that an FIR under Section 304-A and other IPC sections has been filed for lethal construction at DPS CGHS and because of which a construction worker died.
However, the police deliberately did not include the names of the MC members of DPS CGHS who are responsible for this death and this deadly construction was started by Sampathkumar.
And even after the death and multiple accidents in the building, the police, RCS office, and DDA have not stopped dangerous construction at DPS CGHS. Apparently, the DPS CGHS MC members use residents’ money to bribe government officials who do not take action against them.
Although it is mentioned in the police vigilance report shared with me that an FIR No. 102/2022 has been registered in the DPS CGHS case u/s 288 / 337 IPC and additional Section 304-A, the details have not been given, as police want to protect the real culprits in DPS CGHS MC. I am in the process of getting an FIR registered in this death case against the DPS CGHS MC members, including Sampathkumar.
DWARKA COURT CASE
As a journalist and social activist, I (Rakesh Raman) have been complaining and writing editorial reports about the crimes of Sampathkumar and his gang. In order to silence my voice as a journalist, Sampathkumar has been sending multiple threats to me for the past many years.
Sampathkumar’s threats to me include false police complaints against me, threats of physical harm to me, expulsion notices, imposition of arbitrary financial penalties on me, legal notices to implicate me in false cases, and slanderous attacks on my social as well as professional status.
I have given the details of these threats to me from Sampathkumar and his accomplices to Delhi Police and the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of India which has issued notice to the Commissioner of Delhi Police in my case so that I could work and move freely.
Moreover, the Paris-based international organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF) that defends freedom of journalists has urged the Indian government to save me from threats and persecution. In an article written on its website, RSF explains that I have received multiple threats for my reporting.
But with his evil desire to harm me so that I should stop reporting about the criminal activities of Sampathkumar and his accomplices, Sampathkumar – with the help of a couple of his accomplices – filed a false case against me at the Dwarka Courts.
Since Sampathkumar was trying to deceive the court by telling lies and by suppressing the truth about my editorial articles that used multiple government documents to report on his crimes, the court dismissed Sampathkumar’s petition. Now, he has filed a revision petition.
In response to his revision petition, I have urged the court to check the criminal record of Sampathkumar and his internal as well as external accomplices including builders’ mafia companies.
Since Sampathkumar did not tell full facts of his criminality to the court and filed his petition deceptively, I have now provided comprehensive details including government documents of his criminal acts to the court.
I have also provided to the court the names of a number of DPS CGHS members and builders’ mafia companies that have been colluding with Sampathkumar so that the court could begin formal investigation against all of them.
As regards Ms. Jaiswal’s case, the Delhi High Court has asked the DPS CGHS MC to file its reply before the next date of hearing, which is May 28, 2024. I urge Delhi High Court to pass orders for the present and past DPS CGHS MC members to declare their assets. The present and past DPS CGHS MC members are equally involved in the crimes happening in the society.
It is believed that most of these MC members – including Sampathkumar – have amassed assets disproportionate to their known sources of income. If Delhi High Court and the Dwarka Courts fully investigate the corruption case for which the RCS office had appointed District Magistrate Pankaj Kumar (IAS) as the inspection officer, many DPS CGHS MC members – including Sampathkumar – and external company owners may be convicted.
The courts should not allow DPS CGHS MC members – including Sampathkumar – to sell or transfer their flats until the cases against them are fully investigated and until the prosecution ends.
Note: While some documents are included in this editorial report, I will provide to the court and the investigating agencies more documents that prove criminal acts of Sampathkumar and his accomplices.
You can watch the following videos to assess the damage being caused by FAR construction.
Video 1 on FAR Construction
Video 2 on FAR Construction
By Rakesh Raman, who is a national award-winning journalist and social activist. He is the founder of the humanitarian organization RMN Foundation which is working in diverse areas to help the disadvantaged and distressed people in the society.
He runs a community-driven anti-corruption social service “Clean House” to help the residents of Delhi raise their voice against the growing corruption and injustice in housing societies where millions of people suffer because of rampant corruption and lawlessness.
