FIR against two health officials for duping youth of 10L for job

Kolhapur: A case was registered with the Phaltan Rural Police Station against two public health officials on Jan 16 for allegedly cheating a pharmacy diploma holder of Rs10 lakh under the pretext of getting a govt job as a pharmacist.The suspects comprised of a state health department official and another posted at Pune Zilla Parishad's (ZP) health department. The complainant (24), who works with a private pharma company, lodged the complaint with Phaltan Rural Police Station, where the case was registered. The alleged deal took place on Oct 10 last year. On Oct 29, he transferred the amount but understood he was cheated when his name was missing from the shortlisted candidates list. The complainant claimed that he deposited his mother's gold jewellery with a bank to arrange money to pay the officials.The complainant told the police that he applied for the post of Grade C pharmacist, for which the advertisement was floated by the Directorate of Medical Education, Mumbai. He said that when he visited Pune's ZP office for some work, he got acquainted with a staffer from ZP's health department."The staffer called me and told me that he can help get him the post, so I applied. He came to my village and said that I had to pay Rs 10 lakh. He then called a senior health official and showed me his conversation with the person concerned. So, I decided to raise the money, which I did by depositing my mother's gold in the bank. I deposited the money into the bank account of the ZP staffer. Later, he told me that my name would come up in the list of shortlisted candidates, which did not," stated the complainant in the written complaint.Sub-inspector Dipak Pawar, who is the investigating officer (IO) in this case, said that by evening, a team en route to Pune would apprehend one of the accused. "Soon we will have one of the accused in custody," said Pawar.