MIANWALI, Dec 29: An Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) team arrested the stenographer of health executive district officer (EDO) along with marked currency notes he had accepted as gratification allegedly to get a candidate recruited.

The EDO was allegedly recruiting paramedics against Rs125,000 per head gratification collected through his stenographer Muhammad Saleem.

Haji Ehsanullah Khan, who wanted the induction of his brother Irfanullah Khan as laboratory technician, filed a complaint with the ACE.

The ACE marked currency notes worth Rs25,000 which were to be handed over to the stenographer along with another Rs100,000 and gave it to the complainant for delivery.

As soon as the money changed hands, the raiding team headed by Civil Judge Hamid Mehmood and ACE circle in-charge Muhammad Mazhar arrested the stenographer with Rs125,000, including the Rs25,000 marked currency notes.

In his statement before the raiding team, the stenographer said that he was just collecting the gratification for the EDO. The ACE team also seized packs of money collected from other candidates with names of each candidate written on each bundle of Rs125,000.

He said the appointing authority was the EDO and how it was possible for a petty official like him (stenographer) to demand such huge gratification for recruitment of paramedics.

The EDO was not present in his office at the time of the raid. The ACE registered a case against the stenographer.

A health department source, on condition of anonymity, told Dawn that stenographer was innocent. He, however, said that the EDO was an officer having bad repute and he indeed used his subordinate stenographer to collect gratification on his behalf. Complainant Haji Ehsanullah Khan told Dawn that nine more persons had levelled corruption charges against the EDO but the action was taken on his complaint.

He said that his decision to move the ACE was just to eradicate corruption from society. He appealed to Punjab chief minister to hold an inquiry into massive corruption in the local health department.

While talking to Dawn, EDO Dr. Muhammad Ashraf Mian denied the allegations and said that recruitment was being made by a selection committee transparently and he was not responsible for the misdeeds of his stenographer. He said stenographer’s statement before raiding party was just to malign him.