The Enforcement Directorate on Monday attached assets of a retired Employment Provident Fund Organisation employee and his family members, worth ₹ 1.13 crore, in connection with fraudulent diversion of ₹ 1.64 crore pensioners’ fund.
Kondapalli Satyanarayana Rao, according to the ED’s release, diverted the said amounts into personal and bank accounts of relatives between 2011 and 2014, when he was a senior section supervisor at the Kadapa EPFO sub-regional office. And following first information report by Central Bureau of Investigation and Anti-Corruption Bureau, Hyderabad, the ED launched a money laundering investigation.
It was found that Mr. Rao randomly selected pension payment orders from the account data of those who did not receive pension for over three years for reasons of non-submission of life certificates and those involving pension-cum-arrears and benefits. He would tamper with the intended bank reconciliation statements, reports which confirm that payments have been processed into accounts, by filling fictitious names and account numbers.
And as per protocol, the electronic BRS was downloaded, copied to a compact disk and handed over to banks for processing. There were no hard copies of the summary reports mentioning beneficiary and pension details. The data as provided by Mr. Rao was also uploaded by banks without any cross checking and payments were processed. As of Monday, ₹1.64 crore worth properties – a residential flat at ₹ 98.68 lakh and ₹ 12.64 lakh bank balance were attached. A full investigation is underway.
Published - November 22, 2021 09:47 pm IST
