Police station turns into war zone as cops fight over bribe booty

July 23, 2010

All it took was one glimpse of Rs one lakh in crisp currency notes and the Mico Layout Police Station had turned into a battleground with two officers exchanging expletives and almost coming to blows.


Police inspector CN Janardhan Rao at his office in Mico Layout Police Station

The high-decibel drama between Police Inspector C N Janardhan Rao and Sub-Inspector (SI) Narasimhaiah of the police station that started at 7 pm on Wednesday night was triggered by the arrival of a bribe of Rs One lakh. Sources said, “A few days ago Mico Layout's crime team went to Thiruvannamalai in Tamil Nadu and picked up seven persons in connection with a theft case registered with the station. Though the police knew that the accused were involved in criminal activity, they were released.” While the official version claimed there was no link between these men and the case in question, the secret to the release was a deal allegedly struck between the cops and the criminals.

A few constables from Mico Layout police station were despatched to collect the bribe.

However, the arrival of the cash at the station opened a Pandora’s box. “While 80 per cent of the booty was kept back by the inspector, the remaining was given to other members of the team including the SI,” adds the source.

Feeling shortchanged, the men are said to have muttered, “We do the ground work, but you (inspector) take away a large share of the booty.” What followed was a literal free-for-all with both sides hurling the choicest abuses at each other for over 30 minutes. Before leaving office, the miffed inspector even wrote down in the station diary that the SI was not cooperating with him in discharging his duties. The same copy was handed over to the Police Commissioner’s office.

In the meantime, the SI lodged a complaint with the Deputy Commissioner of Police (south-east) BNS Reddy against the inspector.

When contacted, Reddy admitted there was a fight at the police station, but maintained that there was no formal complaint with him. “The SI said he is finding it difficult to work there and that he wants to be transferred,” Reddy said.

Police Commissioner Bidari said, “I don’t know what has happened at the DCP level. I have not received any complaint in this regard so far.

The warring cops

C N Janardhan, a former Christ College student is a 1990 batch sub-inspector. Before being posted to MICO Layout police station, Janardhan was serving as a inspector in a traffic police station in Bangalore. During his stint as the traffic inspector, Janardhan was known as ‘carbon Johnny’ in the police circles. Janardhan allegedly prepared fake challans for traffic violators, hence the sobriquet. For any traffic violator, he used to collect the fine amount and issue fake challans, causing loss to the ex-chequer. After this fraud surfaced, an inquiry was constituted against Janardhan which is said to be still pending. After he was deputed to MICO Layout police station, Janardhan had frequent fights with Narasimaiah, the promotee sub-inspector. Narasimaiah, who was an alcoholic, used to hurl abuse at his inspector Janardhan for collecting bribe from all corners. The inspector and sub-inspector had regular tiffs at the police station, said an officer.