Six held for over Rs 38 lakh fraud in rural job scheme using fake muster rolls
Lucknow: The Balrampur police arrested six individuals for embezzling Rs38.49 lakh from the Mahatma Gandhi national rural employment guarantee scheme (MGNREGS) funds. The arrests were made in connection with the alleged misappropriation of funds allocated for the renovation of three ponds in Bishunpur Tantanwa village under Pachpedwa block.
Police said the sanctioned amount for the project was Rs58.34 lakh. The accused allegedly forged muster rolls in the names of workers to siphon off the funds, without executing the work as per official norms. SP Vikas Kumar supervised the probe, leading to the arrests.
Those arrested were Abdul Wahab, Mohd Zuber Khan, Girija Shankar, Atul Kumar Mishra (son of Ram Prakash Mishra, additional programme officer), Pradeep Kumar Chaudhary (son of Ramchandra, junior engineer) and Ajay Yadav (son of Gulab Chandra Yadav, gram vikas adhikari, resident of Belhar, Sahjanwa, Gorakhpur).
Kumar said a formal complaint was submitted by block development officer (BDO) Mohit Dubey. He reported irregularities in the pond renovation project under MGNREGS in Bishunpur Tantanwa village. An inspection revealed that fake construction activities were shown, with expenses falsely recorded to the tune of Rs58.34 lakh.
An FIR was lodged and an investigation found that the accused passed fake work proposals and used fraudulent muster rolls to divert funds amounting to Rs38.49 lakh.
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Kumar added that the accused operated in a pre-planned, coordinated manner to loot public funds under the guise of MGNREGS work. "The arrested individuals were found to be involved in preparing forged documentation and disbursing wages for non-existent workers to commit fraud," said Kumar.
Kumar added that police have seized records and investigation is ongoing to identify other possible beneficiaries and verify whether similar frauds occurred in nearby villages. The accused have been booked under BNS and were remanded to judicial custody after being presented in court.
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