Bureaucrat arrested for ‘fudging’ date of birth

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 1

A top J&K bureaucrat was arrested by the Crime Branch for allegedly fudging his date of birth in official record.

Administrative Secretary with the administrative reforms, inspection (ARI) and training department MD Khan was arrested by Crime Branch sleuths on Friday night. He is accused of fudging his date of birth records by at least three years.

“The government had written to us that the officer had made insertions in the date of birth in his service book. So we registered a case,” Inspector General Police, Crime, Afadul Mujtaba said, adding that the officer had been arrested.

The Crime Branch will now scrutinise the service record of the Administrative Secretary for further investigation.

Government sources said the officer as per the records was to retire in November this year and had fudged his date of birth by at least three years.

“As per the record available with the government, he was born in November 1958 and was to retire in November 2018. As we were about to issue a notification as per the norms, the officer submitted his APR showing his date of birth as November 1961 and as per it, he had to retired in November 2021. We immediately wrote to the government for a thorough investigation,” a senior government official, privy to the investigation, said. “The case is now being investigated by the Crime Branch.”

This is the first time in recent past that a top bureaucrat has been arrested in J&K on cheating allegations. Before his posting to ARI & training department, Khan had also remained additional secretary with the consumer affairs and public distribution department and agriculture production department.