Odisha vigilance alleges ₹9.24 crore fraud in engineers’ office
Odisha’s Vigilance Directorate says clerical staff and associates diverted ₹9.24 crore through false retirement and contingency bills at a Roads and Buildings office in Bhubaneswar. Authorities have recovered ₹3.96 crore, while four people were arrested for alleged collusion.
Odisha’s Vigilance Directorate says it has detected the alleged embezzlement of ₹9.24 crore from the office of the Superintending Engineer of the Roads and Buildings Division-I in Bhubaneswar. According to the directorate, the fraud occurred between the financial years 2022-23 and 2025-26. It has named section officer Banalata Mohanty and junior assistant Bibhudutta Nayak as the principal accused, alleging that they worked with unidentified associates.
The directorate said false sanction orders and bills were generated for provisional gratuity and unutilised leave salary in the names of retired employees. Other allegedly false claims were made against the office contingency fund. The bills were then processed through the Integrated Financial Management System, allowing government funds to be diverted.
Investigators said genuine bills contained the correct bank details of beneficiaries, while forged bills used account numbers belonging to relatives and acquaintances of the accused. In total, 77 bank accounts held by 48 people were allegedly used to receive the money. The accounts reportedly included those of Mohanty’s son, driver and associates, as well as relatives of Nayak.
The directorate said some account holders transferred money back to the main accused or withdrew cash and handed it over to them. Following the discovery of the alleged fraud and the start of an administrative inquiry, ₹3.96 crore of the misappropriated amount had been recovered, the directorate said. It did not specify how much remained outstanding.
Four people were arrested for alleged collusion with Mohanty and Nayak: colleagues Dipak Kumar Routray and Laxman Biswal, and data-entry operators Rajib Lochan Senapati and Soumya Ranjan Mohapatra. The directorate said ₹32.47 lakh had been credited to Routray’s account and ₹16.21 lakh to Biswal’s. Senapati’s account received ₹28.28 lakh, while Mohapatra’s received ₹35.69 lakh.
The source material did not state whether Mohanty and Nayak had been arrested or provide details of charges filed.
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