CBI news
A special CBI court in Bengaluru has convicted the then Enforcement Officer of the Enforcement Directorate (ED), working in the Bengaluru Directorate, M Lalit Bazad, in a case of accepting a bribe of Rs five lakh.
CBI Special Court Judge Manjunath Sangreshi conducted the hearing on Friday and sentenced the accused to three years of simple imprisonment with a fine of Rs 5.50 lakh. CBI Senior Public Prosecutor Shivanand Perla argued for the CBI.
“CBI Court, Bengaluru, on 25.07.2025, has convicted and sentenced Lalit Bazad, then Enforcement Officer of Enforcement Directorate, working in Bengaluru Directorate (on deputation from Central Goods & Services Tax & Central Excise, Chennai) to three years’ imprisonment with a fine of Rs. 5.5 lakh for having demanded and accepted Rs five lakhs as illegal gratification from a private complainant by putting him under fear of illegal harm to his business and reputation by entangling him in endless legal proceedings,” the CBI said in a press release.
Case details: In February 2021, when M. Lalit Bazad was working as an enforcement officer in ED in Bengaluru, he had issued a summons to the complainant Nikhil Innani to appear at the ED office in Bengaluru in connection with the China loan scam. When the complainant appeared at the ED office in Bengaluru, M. Lalit Bazad had demanded a bribe of Rs five lakh to close the case.
Details of the chargesheet filed by the CBI in the court: The Hyderabad Cyber Crime Police has registered a case against that company. And M Lalit Bazad had threatened the complainant that his accounts would be frozen. He also said that he would harm the complainant’s business. On February 9, 2021, the complainant’s cousin, Harish Innani, delivered money to Bazad at the pub itself through the staff of Levels Pub in J.P. Nagar, Bengaluru. The entire movements of the accused were recorded in the pub’s CCTV footage. The CBI officials had filed a chargesheet in the court on December 20, 2021, in this case.
The special court, considering the CCTV footage, the accused’s misappropriation of power as an enforcement officer, and the evidence presented by the CBI officials regarding the bribe money by threatening the complainant, found Lalit Bazad guilty.
