Here’s all you need to know about Pune connection of Aakash Pathak, son of Odisha IFS officer arrested in disproportionate assets case

Pune : Investigations into the disproportionate assets case has revealed that Aakash Pathak, son of Odisha IFS officer Abhay Kant Pathak, had rented a farmhouse and two mercedes cars in pune with a total monthly rent of Rs 30 lakh and used to travel to Pune, Mumbai, Delhi and other cities in a charter plane even during the lockdown in the country.

The Odisha Government on Friday suspended Abhay Kant Pathak, a top official from the Indian Forest Service (IFS). Pathak was currently serving as the Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF), Plan, Program and Afforestation, Odisha. The father-son duo was arrested by the anti-corruption vigilance in a disproportionate asset case. Aakash was taken in custody from Pune and has been flown to Bhubaneshwar. Their bail application has been rejected and they both are now in judicial custody till December 9.

Aakash has graduated from a Bhubaneswar-based engineering college in 2017. He has also been charged for faking his identity as a  Managing Director (In Charge) of Passenger Vehicle division of Tata Motors at Pune. Investigations revealed that Akash was running a fake recruitment racket in Odisha’s Gopalpur area and had hired two Mercedes cars for Rs 25 lakh in Pune city. The anti-corruption officials have seized a ‘letter of intent’ issued purportedly by Tata Motors to candidates after interviews in April. A list of 68 candidates, who had appeared for interviews and cleared, is under scrutiny of both Vigilance as well as the Crime Branch.

Tata Motors have issued a clarification on Friday stating that Akash was not a bona fide employee of the company. After the company received an alert that ‘one Akash Kumar Pathak was impersonating as Managing Director (In Charge) of Passenger Vehicle division at Pune’, it had lodged a complaint with the Crime Branch in Odisha.

Investigations have unearthed the father-son duo’s splurge on charter flights, hotels, travels to foriegn locations too. Officials informed Aakash was also paying huge sums on rents of flats, office and farmhouse, and salary for a set of employees in Pune.

Akash was slated to marry the daughter of a ruling party leader from Gopalpur next month. The 1987 batch IFS officer was found in possession of disproportionate assets to the tune of Rs 9.35 crore beyond his known sources of income. This amount was about 435 per cent of the total income from all his known sources, an official statement said.

The Vigilance has also come across at least Rs 70 lakh in deposits made in Berhampur region. There are mentions of payments in WhatsApp chats too. Before nabbing the father and son, five raids across Orissa, Pune and Mumbai.

During the raids, the officials from the ACB recovered ₹50 lakh in cash from Abhay Kant Pathak’s nephew, ₹20 lakh from his driver, gold ornaments weighing 800 gm and documents relating to purchase of gold jewellery worth ₹23 lakh, the statement said.