CHANDIGARH — Anti-corruption officials raiding a senior police officer's residences this week expressed deep admiration for the man's work ethic after discovering he was still actively extorting Rs 5 lakh from a local scrap dealer despite sitting on Rs 7.5 crore in undeclared cash and 50 property documents.

The suspended Deputy Inspector General, whose father also served at the highest levels of the state police, was arrested in October for accepting the monthly "sewa-paani" to settle a 2023 FIR. Investigators noted that managing an illicit real estate empire spanning Punjab, Haryana, and Himachal Pradesh would typically cause a public servant to neglect their day-to-day extortion duties, making the officer's dedication to small-scale shakedowns highly unusual.

"When you have 2.5 kg of gold and suspicious property investments worth up to Rs 23 crore, it can be hard to find the motivation to harass a scrap dealer for a mere five lakh," said an official reviewing the benami transaction files managed by the officer's property dealer associates. "Most men in his position would rest on their laurels, but he never lost touch with his grassroots corruption."

The officer's middleman, who was arrested by the CBI while accepting the latest routine installment, reportedly apologized to the victim for the inconvenience, noting that the Rs 5 lakh was desperately needed to pay the property taxes on the syndicate's 49th benami plot.