A junior engineer of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), who was booked in 2017 for allegedly demanding a bribe of Rs 30,000 from a hotel owner, has been acquitted by a special court. The court said that as demolition was carried out at the hotel owner’s property a month before the complaint, it cannot be ruled out that the allegations were made as ‘revenge’. According to the prosecution, the hotel owner had carried out some repairs for which a complaint was filed with the civic body. The owner had claimed that Lokhande sought a bribe of Rs 30,000 to grant him permission for regularising the repairs. It also said that the complainant himself was not sure why the bribe was sought as per his testimony before the court.