The CBI arrested Harish Kumar Tanwar, a Deputy Director at the SFIO, for demanding a ₹1 crore bribe on October 15, 2026. Officials said he sought money to favour a person in the DHFL loan scam. The agency caught him and two others after they got ₹20 lakh as payment.
After nabbing a defence public sector undertaking officer, the CBI has picked up an IRS officer of Income Tax of 2017 batch posted as Dy Director, Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO), at Chennai on charges of demanding a bribe of ₹1 crore for granting favour DHFL loan scam-linked case.
Harish Kumar Tanwar, his conduit Delhi-based advocate Bharat Sharma and his relative Aryan Sharma, were arrested by the CBI for allegedly receiving ₹20 lakh as part payment of the bribe, the officials alleged.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) registered an FIR following allegation that Tanwar and Sharma allegedly demanded ₹1 crore from a complainant for allegedly favouring him in an SFIO investigation in the case linked to the ₹34,000-crore DHFL loan fraud, a agency spokesperson said in a statement.
"After verification of the complaint and registration of the FIR, the CBI laid a trap and arrested a Deputy Director-level officer of SFIO, one Delhi-based advocate and another private person after the advocate received an undue advantage of ₹20 lakh from the complainant as part payment of the demanded bribe of ₹1 crore, for and on behalf of the SFIO officer," the statement read.
The agency claims to have recovered incriminating material during searches at the Tanwar and his accomplices residences.
More than year ago, Tanwar joined the SFIO, Ministry of Corporate Affairs, as Deputy Director (Investigation).
The SFIO has been probing the massive ₹34,000-crore to ₹34,615-crore loan and bank fraud case involving Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Limited (DHFL). It is alleged that DHFL's promoters -- Kapil and Dheeraj Wadhawan -- created thousands of fictitious home loan and loan-against-property (LAP) accounts under a separate "Bandra" branch code. This was allegedly done to make it appear as a massive portfolio of genuine retail home buyers, but actually they were dummy accounts.