The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a case against IAS officer Kumar Rajeev Ranjan, posted in Jammu and Kashmir, and his family members for amassing disproportionate assets (DA) on Thursday.
This development underscores the long delays from the J&K government and bureaucratic hurdles in investigating a massive arms licensing scam he had issued to the non-residents.
Currently serving as the secretary of the labour and employment department in J&K, Ranjan was previously the deputy commissioner of Kupwara.
The CBI’s investigation into Ranjan’s alleged DA case comes as part of a wider probe into irregularities in the issuance of over 2.78 lakh arms licenses to non-residents between 2012 and 2016. The FIR, filed on February 17th, names Ranjan, his family members Kirpa Shankar Roy and Dulari Devi, and other unknown individuals as accused.
The CBI conducted searches across seven locations, including Ranjan’s office in Jammu and residences in Varanasi, Srinagar, and Gurugram on Wednesday during an anti-corruption operation. The agency estimates that the arms licensing irregularities could involve more than Rs 100 crore in illicit gains.
The central government approved the prosecution of Ranjan in November 2024, following a request by the CBI. The agency sought prosecution sanction against eight IAS officers implicated in the scam. The details of Ranjan’s alleged DA are yet to be made public.
The initial uncovering of this extensive racket can be traced back to 2017 when Rajasthan police uncovered irregularities and wrote to the J&K government without receiving a response. The Rajasthan ATS highlighted that 1,32,321 of the 1,43,013 licences issued in Doda, Ramban and Udhampur, three districts of the Jammu region were granted to non-residents. A sample survey of Kupwara revealed a shocking lack of proper record-keeping and potential widespread forgery in the issuance of arms licenses.
The figure for the entire state was estimated to be 4,29,301, of which just 10% were issued to residents in the state.
The High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh comprising Chief Justice Tashi Rabstan and Justice MA Chowdhary recently intervened, directing the Union home ministry to provide an update on the prosecution sanction for three other IAS officers. A parallel money-laundering investigation is also being conducted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which alleges that the accused directly jeopardised state security.