Lucknow DD chief in CBI net

A special CBI team on Friday arrested the Director of Lucknow Doordarshan, Prabhu Jhingran, after setting a trap to catch him red handed whi...

A special CBI team on Friday arrested the Director of Lucknow Doordarshan, Prabhu Jhingran, after setting a trap to catch him red handed while accepting a bribe of Rs 1 lakh from a producer this evening. Jhingran who held the post for the last three years, is set to lose his job.

The CBI immediately took Jhingran into custody after verifying the numbers of the notes received by him as the bribe for clearing a serial produced by Vishal Chaturvedi, the son of Hindi satirist Shail Chaturvedi. The CBI team raided his Dalibagh Colony house from where around Rs 10 lakh was recovered in cash.

‘‘There will be more cash as the search is continued. The bundles of notes were stacked in a room in his government accommodation,’’ said a woman constable especially called to the house by the CBI, to help in the raid. The house was allotted to his wife, Rita Prabhu, a journalist in Varanasi.

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Jhingran began his career as a Hindi officer in the Allahabad Bank but was smart enough to grab the post of director of Lucknow Doordarshan after quitting his initial job. ‘‘He had good connections in the former BJP-led government, and used his clout to get the present post despite the fact that he was an outsider,’’ a Doordarshan journalist said.

Sources in Doordarshan said the CBI was after Jhingran for the last three months following reports that he was demanding money to clear the episodes to be aired by Lucknow Doordarshan. The CBI officials finally found success on Friday. Jhingran will be produced in court on Saturday.