India's CBI clears former AMU official of graft raps

India's Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Sunday exonerated Prof. P. K. Abdul-Azis, the former vice chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), from a series of corruption charges that were labelled against him by his rivals.
The CBI has submitted its report on the alleged financial irregularities involving the VC as the agency couldn’t find anything incriminating against him.
Talking to Arab News over phone, Azis, currently the vice chancellor of the University of Science and Technology, Meghalaya, expressed his happiness over the CBI decision.
“Thanks to Almighty Allah, the CBI clean chit has come as a big relief,” he said and expressed thanks to the agency for “bringing out the truth.”
“I am also thankful to my well wishers for having full faith in me. I can now easily take my mission for the upliftment of education ahead.”
Azis was AMU vice chancellor from 2007 to 2012, in which period several allegations were made against him by his rivals including misconduct under the AMU Act 1920, violating the statutes directives, ordinances and regulations of the AMU Grant Commission.
Azis, it was alleged, made the AMU pay his income tax besides violating university rules by transferring Rs 80 million of Provident Fund money from the State Bank of India to Shreyas Gramin Bank.
It was also alleged that the university funds were misused for interior decoration of his residence. At least 26 charges were framed against him, out of which 17 were of administrative level, but Azis had refuted these charges.
The Union Ministry of Human Resources and Development set two panels to probe the matter, but their findings remained inconclusive. Later at the request of Kapil Sibal, the former minister of human resources and development, the CBI began the investigation.
It first registered a preliminary inquiry in July 2011 after it was alleged that he had flouted rules of the institution for his own benefits. He was grilled for alleged financial irregularities too.
Giving clean chit to Azis, the CBI had submitted the closure report at Patiala House court of CBI Judge Swarnakanta Sharma.