Rinku Singh Rahi

Background Rinkoo Singh Rahee has been fighting corruption in his own department and state-run schemes since 2009. He was denied access to information on his own department. Instead, an attempt on his life was made allegedly at the behest of Principal Secretary Navtej Singh, and other department officials during the Mayawati government. He started a hunger strike in Lucknow hoping the Akhilesh Yadav government would pay heed to his demands for a reply on his pending RTI application; a criminal investigation into the corruptions charges; and act against miscreants but instead was admitted to a psychiatric ward.

Life and early career

He was born in Aligarh to a lower middle-class family on 20 May 1982. He did his elementary schooling in Aligarh and completed his BTech degree in Metallurgy at NIT, Jamshedpur in 2002. In the same year, he scored All India 17th rank in GATE that assured him a seat in his desired stream at any top technological institute. He opted for a civil service career instead. In pursuit of his objective, he undertook various civil services examinations/interviews. He passed the Uttar Pradesh Upper Subordinate Services examination in 2004, and was selected on the post of District social welfare officer and was posted at Muzaffarnagar in 2008.

He showed interest in social development from his early years and took initiative in establishing a "Library" and "Adult education center" at Aligarh. He was then posted as a coordinater at the state-run coaching institute for IAS and IPS aspirants from the Dalit community at Aligarh.

He continued to prepare for the civil services examination and cleared the UPSC Civil Services Examination in the year 2022 and was allotted the Indian Administrative Service in the Uttar Pradesh cadre.

Muzaffarnagar welfare fund corruption scandal

The social welfare department at Muzaffarnagar distributed over annually to beneficiaries under various state-run welfare schemes. Rahi ordered an inquiry into the allocation of funds over the last five years, soon after he arrived.

Rahee complained to his seniors and also informed Bhuvneesh Kumar, a District Magistrate of Muzaffaranagar, about the irregularities. Kumar said that a few days before the attack Rahee had told him of the irregularities, and had planned to computerise a record of what he had discovered, but before he could do that, he was attacked.

Armed attack After Rahee's complaints, armed miscreants shot him six time when he was playing badminton on the morning of 26 March 2009. His jaw was severely damaged and he lost the vision of one eye, but survived.

Police found that the attack was carried out by local gangsters at the behest of welfare department officials. Police arrested nine people, including Mukesh Chaudhary, a Samajwadi Party (SP) leader, and Ashok Kashyap, an assistant accountant at the welfare department. According to police, Mukesh Chaudhary was annoyed that Rahi did not sanction scholarships for some students and Ashok Kashyap was annoyed as Rahi had ordered a departmental inquiry into the alleged corruption. Rahee said that he sought to discover where the unused funds went, and filed an application under the Right to Information Act, 2005 to discover who beneficiaries were, but did not receive the full details, and had therefore filed an appeal.

Hunger strike and attempted hospitalisation Speaking at a one-day token fast launched at Jantar Mantar on 25 March 2012 by anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare, Rahi announced that he too would undertake a hunger strike starring 26 March 2012 at Lucknow, in part because his RTI request had been rejected. He was given an insignificant position – as a coordinator at the Dr. B.R.Ambedkar IAS PCS Coaching Centre. He said that senior officials of the police department had refused to co-operate with him after he provided them with details of the scam, and that RTI requests had not been honoured.

In March 2026, Rinkoo SIngh tendered a 'technical resignation', alleging denial of posting. He stated that he was being sidelined and prevented from conducting any meaningful work. His resignation led to an uproar in the Indian administration that began searching his records for irregularities, but found none. Finally, Anil Kumar, Chairman of the Revenue Council, assured Rinkoo that they would respect his concerns and provide him with a useful post. Following this declaration he withdrew his resignation. During the controversy, Rinkoo Singh alleged a parallel system of corruption that exists within the bureaucracy and protected by the IAS association.