Engineer Poses as ACB Officer and Raids Schools to Impress Girl, Lands in Jail

Kota, (Rajasthan): He allegedly posed as an Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) official, raided schools, harassed principals and teachers and even tricked media into believing and quoting him to assert his authenticity.

But all these drama to impress a girl into marrying him didn't yield him the desired result as 23-year-old CL Thikariya, an engineer by degree, was found out by the organisation he was claiming to be an officer of, and ended up in jail.

Thikariya was held on Monday by ACB Kota officials and handed over to the police at the Kethoon police station. He was produced in a court on Tuesday, which sent him to a one-day police custody, police said. Investigating officer of the case ASI Ram Pal said that it was revealed during the primary interrogation that the accused was a B. Tech degree holder and had last month visited Kota in a community function where he came in contact with a girl of his community.

In order to impress the girl into marrying him, the accused posed as an ACB official and visited the government schools. He also released media statement to assert authenticity and showed newspaper releases to the girl, he said.

The ACB was alerted about the impostor after a story appeared in a Hindi daily about ACB finding "irregularities" in mid-day meal and other schemes in government schools at Mandaniya and Chandida villages, ACB Kota inspector Vivek Soni said.

The newspaper quoted CL Thikariya in the news story, he said.

After the news appeared, the ACB tried to find out if there was any official with the name in the organisation, Soni said.

When no official with the name CL Thikariya was found, the ACB suspected foul play and formed a team to trace the impostor, he said.

"The ACB team, with the help of cyber and IT experts, traced him and eventually at around 3 AM yesterday, the impostor was rounded up from a house in Borekheda area of Kota city," Soni said.

Some fake ACB and media identity cards were also recovered from him, the officer added.

Over the last few months, Thikariya allegedly visited government schools in the district and bullied principals and teachers by asking them fund details on mid-day meal and other schemes, Soni said.

"However he did not demand money from any of the school staff."

The fake ACB official is a native of Mahindipur Balaji area of Dausa district, Soni said, adding he was handed over to the police at Kethoon police station and an FIR in the matter against him was filed.

A case under section 417 (punishment for cheating) and 419 (punishment for cheating by personation) of the IPC was lodged against Thikariya, Kethoon police station SHO Pushpendra Hada said.

The accused has been arrested and further interrogation into the matter is underway, he said.