Another PNB loan scam
After the Rs 13,000-crore loan scam involving diamond merchant Nirav Modi, another loan scam in the Punjab National Bank has shaken Guwahati. Sleuths of the Bureau of Investigation Economic Offences (BIEO) have arrested five people in connection with the scam. The accused had availed of loan from a PNB branch fraudulently by submitting fake documents. The loan was taken against a flat registered in someone else’s name. During the course of investigation, it was found that the papers submitted were bogus. The BIEO has registered a case under Sections 120(B), 468, 420, 406 of the Indian Penal Code.
CID unravels smuggling racket
Allegations that coal-smuggling thrives in Guwahati are not new. Finally, a racket involving senior officials of the transport department was busted by the Criminal Investigation Department of the Assam police. Sleuths of the CID unraveled a nexus between smugglers and a section of senior officials. The CID summoned six officials for questioning but they did not appear before the investigation team. The officials were alleged to have helped the smugglers in lieu of money. Additional superintendent of police, Nirmal Baishya, said the CID would take necessary actions if the officials failed to comply with the order again.
Women maintain railway coaches
In a first in the history of Railways, the coaching depot in Guwahati has engaged an all-woman gang for maintenance of coaches. With the increase in number of trains from the Guwahati station, there was an increase in the maintenance needs of the incoming coaches in the pit line. The depot has a coach holding of about 1,300 and its activities are spread over Kamakhya, Paltan Bazaar and New Guwahati with a total of six pit lines and two sick lines and a staff of about 1,000 technicians. Out of these, about 200 are ladies. The maintenance work at the pit lines has predominantly been in a male domain with work involved in all three shifts requiring the staff to go inside the dockpits.
City gears up to face floods
Artificial floods wreak havoc in Guwahati every year that throw life out of gear and claim many lives. With the onset of summer, the district authorities met recently to chalk out plans for the safety of the denizens. At a meeting convened by district magistrate Virendra Mittal, who is also the chairman of Kamrup (metro) district disaster management authorities, instructions were given to civic authorities to clean up the drains at all 31 wards in the city. Mittal also asked the health department to stockpile medicines.
Prasanta Mazumdar
Our correspondent in Guwahati
prasantamazumdar@newindianexpress.com