CBI Books its Legal Advisor on Charges of Forging Signature of Her Boss

New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case against its own Deputy Legal Advisor (DLA) deputed in the agency's Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) division on charges of forging the signature of the unit head for showing favourable assessment reports for her promotion.

The central probe agency on Monday registered an FIR against Beena Raizada, posted in the CBI AC-VI unit, which is probing the Vyapam scam, for forging the signatures of ACB's Head of Branch (HoB) VK Singh.

Raizada was posted in CBI's Patna Zone office in Bihar when the alleged assessment reports were forged. She forged signatures of Singh, who was then posted as CBI's Deputy Inspector General in Patna. He is currently posted as Inspector General in the Jaipur range, Rajasthan Police.

Raizada has been booked for forgery, use of bogus documents and fraudulently committing mischief of documents.

The agency's move came following an October 27 complaint of its Deputy Superintendent of Police (AC-V unit Bhopal) Ashish Prasad.

Raizada is accused of "interpolation in the assessment notes issued under the signatures of Singh for the years 2014, 2015 and 2016".

"During enquiry, it was revealed that Raizada joined as Senior Public Prosecutor in CBl's ACB division in Patna on May 5, 2014 and on promotion, she joined as DLA at the agency's Patna Zone on November 17, 2014. She was later relieved from there on January 5, 2017 upon her transfer to CBl, AC-VI unit, New Delhi.

"In the CBI headquarters in New Delhi, she personally submitted her three APARs (Authorized Program Analysis Report) together for the years 2014, 2015 and 2016 along with the assessment notes for the same period bearing the signatures of V.K. Singh," the CBI FIR said.

As per the FIR, Singh accepted that the signatures on Raizada's assessment notes resembled his own but he denied making those signatures.

"He stated that Raizada was not on duty for a period of 90 days during 2014 and 2015 and therefore, there was no question of writing an assessment report in her favour. He stated that similarly there was no question of writing assessment report in her favour for the period 2016 since he was repatriated in 2015 to parent department," said the FIR.

As per procedure, the assessment notes for the law officers of the level of Assistant Public Prosecutor, Public Prosecutor and Senior Public Prosecutor posted in the branch are issued by DIG or HoB for annual appraisal.