Bhubaneswar: Former IAS officer Vinod Kumar and six others have been convicted for misappropriation of government funds during his tenure as Managing Director of Odisha Rural Housing Development Corporation (ORHDC).

A Special Vigilance Court in Bhubaneswar convicted Vinod Kumar, former ORHDC company secretary Swosti Ranjan Mohapatra, former accounts officer Pradeep Kumar Rout, former junior loan officer Satya Prakash Behera, former system analyst Janendra Swain and Ecstasy Builders & Developers Pvt. Ltd proprietor Sangram Keshari Sahoo in the corruption case.

The court sentenced all the convicts to three years of rigorous imprisonment (RI) and imposed penalties on them.

Vinod Kumar dismissed from IAS job in 2022

Earlier, the Vigilance Department had submitted chargesheet against them in a case registered under Sections 13(2) r/w 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act,1988 and Sections 468, 471, 420, 120-B of the IPC.

In the chargesheet, Vinod Kumar and the other six others were accused of misappropriating government funds to the tune of Rs 52.95 lakh from the ORHDC. Kumar and other five former ORHDC officials had also shown undue favour to realtor Sangram Keshari Sahoo through forged documents.

It is worth mentioning here that Vinod Kumar was convicted for the 12th time in the ORHDC scam. Kumar has been booked in as many as 27 graft cases and he was dismissed from IAS job in 2022.