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Now, home guards’ salary fraud surfaces in Lucknow
LUCKNOW After the expose of fraudulent withdrawal of home guards’ salaries in Gautam Buddh Nagar earlier this month, a similar fraud surfaced in Lucknow during inquiry
LUCKNOW After the expose of fraudulent withdrawal of home guards’ salaries in Gautam Buddh Nagar earlier this month, a similar fraud surfaced in Lucknow during inquiry about deployment of home guards at police station level. The city police on Thursday arrested the Lucknow district commandant of home guards Kripa Shankar Pandey after registering an FIR at Gomti Nagar police station against unknown officials and personnel of district homes guards’ office.
Senior superintendent of police (SSP), Lucknow, Kalanidhi Naithani said Kripa Shankar Pandey was arrested after finding his involvement in the salary withdrawal fraud during initial investigation. He said the anomalies were detected during inquiries at police station level about deployment of a number of home guards personnel and withdrawal of their salaries according to their duty days.
“Major anomalies were detected while comparing the home guards’ attendance register with the General Diary (GD) of the Gudamba police station that has details of deployment done at the police station level. Nearly three times deployment was shown in the home guards’ attendance register in comparison to the original deployment,” Naithani said, adding, “Inspector of Gudamba police station has lodged the FIR with the Gomti Nagar police as the district home guards office comes under its jurisdiction.”
Inspector of Gudamba police station Ritendra Pratap Singh mentioned in the FIR that the inquiry was about the deployment of home guards in July and August, 2019. He said a major difference was found about the original deployment of home guards than shown in the attendance register.
He said the attendance register showed that 23 home guards were on duty in August but the GD confirmed that only eight home guards reported on duty at the police station. He said this suggested that around ₹ 4.99 lakh extra was released on the pretext of providing daily wages to the home guards mentioned in the attendance register.
The SSP said that similar anomalies in deployment of home guards and release of their salaries were found during inquiry in Vibhuti Khand police station.
Inspector of Gomti Nagar police station Amit Dubey said the FIR was registered against unidentified home guard officials and personnel under IPC sections 409 for criminal breach of trust by public servant, 420 for cheating, 467 for forging the official documents, 468 for forgery for purpose of cheating and 471 for using forged document as genuine.
Earlier on Wednesday, five Home Guards officers — a divisional commandant, an assistant district commandant and three platoon commanders — were arrested on Wednesday for allegedly fraudulently withdrawing salaries of their colleagues in Gautam Buddh Nagar.
The Gautam Buddh Nagar police had registered an FIR on November 13 and soon after this the salary registers were burnt on November 18, allegedly to conceal evidences related to anomalies in the home guards’ deployment. The five home guards officials were arrested after the chief minister Yogi Adityanath took cognizance of the incident.
