ORHDC scam: Two former staff sentenced to 3 years in jail

Bhubaneswar: The Special Vigilance Court, Bhubaneswar has sentenced the two former employees of Odisha Rural Housing Development Corporation (ORHDC) to three years in jail each in connection with financial irregularities in the Corporation.

The court also slapped a fine of Rs 75,000 on each of the two.

Pradip Rout (accounts officer) and Chitta Mallick (accountant) of OHRDC had surrendered before the court earlier today. The court had issued a non-bailable warrant (NBW) against them.

Rout and Mallick will be sent to Jharpada Jail in the city, sources said.

Earlier, two other former staff of the Corporation were sentenced to jail terms by the court.

The court, in July, had convicted senior IAS officer and former Managing Director of ORHDC, Vinod Kumar and five employees in connection with the fraud. Of the six, only Sanjay Mohanty, Assistant Manager of the Corporation, had appeared in the court on that day.

The Vigilance Directorate had registered a case against Kumar and the five employees of the Corporation for financial irregularities to the tune of Rs 55 lakh in 2000.

During his tenure at the Corporation in 2000-01, Kumar had allegedly unscrupulously granted loans to builders and contractors without obtaining adequate collateral security and proper scrutiny. Besides, no follow-up action was allegedly taken by the Corporation to recover the loans.