Wheat embezzlement: Food Civil Supplies Inspector booked for Rs20-crore fraud

PK Jaiswar

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, August 7

Following the complaint of District Food and Civil Supplies Controller Rishi Raj Mehra, the Amritsar rural police have booked custodian inspector Jasdev Singh on the charge of fraud (420, IPC) and criminal breach of trust (409, IPC) and other relevant sections of the IPC.

Jasdev Singh mysteriously disappeared last week. Following this, the head of the vigilance committee of the department has ordered physical verification of eight godowns which were looked after by him.

The incident came to light when the Food Corporation of India was to upload wheat in a special train from the Gehri Mandi railway station and as per the norms, it was mandatory for the custodian inspector to remain present with the record. However, he was not present there. When officials called him, his mobile was switched off. Even his family members have also disappeared from the house. Jasdev was the custodian of eight godowns located in Jandiala, Gehri Mandi and Dhire Kot villages.

He allegedly took along the records pertaining to these godowns from his office. Arshdeep Singh, Assistant Food and Civil Supply Officer, here said he was repeatedly asked to submit the record which he never did. Therefore, higher authorities were informed about this.

Following this, the department decided to hold a physical verification by its vigilance department. The physical verification continued for two days and the department found as many as 87,160 quintals of wheat worth Rs 20 crores missing. According to the complaint submitted to the police, the DFSC said as many as 1,45,787 bags of 50-kg wheat each belonging to Pungrain and 47,556 bags containing 30-kg wheat each (total 1,93,343 bags) were found bungled from eight godowns.

The Food and Civil Supply Department on behalf of PUNGRAIN and the Punjab Government procured the grains from the grain market.

Sources, however, pointed out that the sheer quantity of wheat bungled pointed out that he was not alone in the embezzlement. “A truck can load maximum 500 bags. This means nearly 400 trucks were used to ferry the bungled wheat,” he said. How come no other person in the department got to know about where such a huge quantity of wheat went? Further, this can never be possible without political patronage, they added.