The Vigilance has found bribery to be rampant at Regional Transport Offices (RTO) in Kerala with agents using mobile payment apps to transfer the bribe money to officials.
Surprise inspections were done in at least 56 RTOs and Joint RTOs in the state on Friday under Operation Jasoos launched by Vigilance Director, ADGP Manoj Abraham.
It is understood that the Vigilance had received several complaints from the public alleging officials withholding files with the alleged intention of demanding bribes.
In an RTO in Kozhikode district, over 3,000 such files were found during the inspection. In Thrissur, a host of RTO files were found in the possession of agents.
Special ATM cards for bribe money
One of the revelations from the raids was that the agents were transferring bribe money to MVD (Motor Vehicle Department) officials using mobile payment apps such as GPay.
In an RTO in Kozhikode, the Vigilance unearthed another technique adopted by the agent-official nexus. There, agents were found to have opened a bank account to hold bribe money, which was withdrawn by the officials using the ATM cards that would be returned to the agents after each withdrawal.
Besides, unaccounted sums were confiscated from several agents connected to various RTOs.
At Kondotty, Rs 1.60 lakh, Kottayam (1.25 lakh) and Nedumbangad (1 lakh) were found during the inspections. Similarly, unaccounted sums were found at RTOs in Ranni, Konni, Parassala, Malappuram, Adimali, Changanassery and Kanjirappilly.
It is understood that the Vigilance will table its report to the MVD and the state government and appropriate action will be taken based on that.
