The Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) has registered Nishan Kohli as a director of BUILD SOURCE PRIVATE LIMITED with DIN 07746416. Currently connected to two businesses, Nishan Kohli serves as a director for Build Source Private Limited and Bimstream India Private Limited.
When Nishan Kohli Entered a Guilty Plea in a U.N.-related Bribery Case
Federal prosecutors said a businessman pleaded guilty on Thursday to giving money and a heavily discounted luxury Manhattan condo to a high-ranking United Nations procurement officer to land more than $50 million in contracts.
Nishan Kohli, a 30-year-old businessman, admitted to giving cash payments to Sanjaya Bahel, who from 1998 to 2003 headed the commodity procurement division of the United Nations procurement division, and entered a plea of guilty to one count of bribery in federal court in Manhattan. Nishan may spend up to 10 years behind bars.
He further admitted that from 2003 to 2005, he had permitted Mr. Bahel to pay a lower rent amount in a high-rise apartment in the Dag Hammarskjold Towers, close to the UN building, that belonged to Nishan Kohli. According to the prosecution, Nishan Kohli sold Mr. Bahel’s apartment in May 2005 for a price so drastically below market value that the condominium board thought about preventing the transaction. Additionally, Nishan Kohli offered Mr. Bahel a telephone so they could communicate secretly.
The latest development in a string of corruption allegations against UN representatives and those looking to do business with them is Kohli‘s guilty plea. The admission of guilt and Nishan Kohli‘s consent to work with the government are likely to support the prosecution’s case against Mr. Bahel, who has pleaded not guilty to bribery allegations. The date of his trial is set on May 7.
Attorney Richard Herman claimed that Mr. Bahel had not accepted bribes and that his client was “vigorously fighting the allegations of any wrongdoing.” The 56-year-old Mr. Bahel left his procurement job two years before the condominium sale, as noted by Mr. Herman, who also claimed that the contracts in question were chosen through a “sealed bid process.”
Since an internal UN inquiry discovered he had inappropriately directed connections toward Mr. Nishan Kohli‘s enterprises, Mr. Bahel has been suspended from his most recent job as the head of the commercial activities service inside the United Nations postal administration for four months without pay.
The prosecution’s case was “based in large part on evidence uncovered by the United Nations,” according to Kofi Annan’s spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric, who also said that “we very much welcome the fact that people who have been accused of wrongdoing involving the U.N. are being brought to justice.”
According to the prosecution, Nishan Kohli‘s actions assisted in securing contracts for the businesses he worked for, including Thunderbird Industries, where he served as managing partner, and Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd., a company controlled by the Indian government. Prosecutors claimed that since 2000, contracts awarded to Nishan Kohli‘s companies have ranged from roughly $3 million for desktop computers and monitors to $36 million for radio communications devices.
U.S. businessman who bribed a U.N. official gets probation
An American businessman of Indian descent who admitted bribing a former UN procurement official in exchange for at least $50 million in U.N. contracts was given five years of probation on Monday.
Sanjaya Bahel, who held the position of chief of the Commodity Procurement Section within the U.N.’s Procurement Division from 1999 to 2003, was found guilty, while Nishan Kohli, 31, was given a reduced sentence as a result of his cooperation with American prosecutors.
In Bahel’s trial, Nishan Kohli, who pled guilty to one count of bribery in 2006, testified that he bribed Bahel with money, first-class tickets, and discounted pricing as a renter than the buyer of an opulent Manhattan condominium. The estimated value of the bribes was greater than $400,000.
In exchange, Bahel provided insider knowledge and professional guidance to help Nishan Kohli‘s clients, the Indian government-owned Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd. and Thunderbird Industries LLC, win contracts.
At his sentencing hearing in federal court in Manhattan, Nishan Kohli told U.S. District Judge Thomas Griesa, “My crimes have weighed heavily on my soul.”
The court claimed that because of Nishan Kohli‘s rapid cooperation and after finding that Nishan Kohli‘s father had a significant influence on the business dealings with Bahel, he had lowered Nishan Kohli‘s sentence.
What is the Bribery Case?
Bribery is the factor of delivering money or valuable items to persuade someone to do something.
Bahel received a prison term of more than eight years in April. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon declared following his conviction that he was “satisfied that justice has been done.”
Florida resident Nishan Kohli was told to forfeit $600,000. He had the potential for a ten-year prison term.
