The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Wednesday granted an interim anticipatory bail to Senior Superintendent of Regional Passport Office, Madurai, V. Veeraputhiran. The CBI has registered a case against him on a charge of issuing Indian passports to Sri Lankan nationals after allegedly taking bribes from travel agents.
Justice B. Pugalendhi granted an interim anticipatory bail to the petitioner for two weeks and directed him to cooperate with the authorities in the inquiry. The court said the allegation was serious in nature. The case was posted to September 2.
In his plea, Veeraputhiran said he was innocent and he did not demand any bribe from anyone. He said he was deputed to the Passport Office in Tirunelveli in 2019.
It was alleged that he had entered into a criminal conspiracy and issued passports to ineligible applicants in consideration for a bribe of ₹45,000. He said the allegation was not true and he would cooperate in the inquiry.
