The Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC) on Wednesday arrested a sanitation worker attached to the Polonnaruwa Provincial Revenue District Office for soliciting a bribe to falsify a land valuation.
The suspect was apprehended at approximately 9:27 AM at the District Revenue Office while accepting Rs. 35,000, reduced from an initial demand of Rs. 50,000. The bribe was solicited to prepare a valuation report with a lower land value so that stamp duty payable on a deed transfer of government land would be reduced, CIABOC said.
The arrest followed a complaint by a Polonnaruwa-area resident. The suspect is to be produced before the Polonnaruwa Magistrate’s Court.
The case is a district-level CIABOC operation focused on the procedural mechanics of stamp-duty manipulation. It comes as the commission continues a heavy caseload across multiple accountability tracks, from the Airbus bribery prosecution of former officials to the Cabraal Greek Bond indictments and the recent summoning of former president Mahinda Rajapaksa over the Airbus deal.
