KOCHI: The state government on Tuesday informed the Kerala High Court that a new case has been registered concerning the alleged misappropriation of `73.13 lakh from the Chief Minister’s Distress Relief Fund (CMDRF) for flood relief in 2018 in Ernakulam district and investigation has started. Opposing the bail plea of N N Nidhin, sixth accused in the case, Advocate Amjad Ali, public prosecutor, informed the court that the case has been registered based on the complaint of the Additional District Magistrate.
It was registered on May 23 at Thrikkakara police station in connection with suspected misappropriation of fund remitted by beneficiaries directly at the collectorate. The court later dismissed the bail petition after finding merit in the arguments of the prosecutor that if the accused was granted bail, there was a chance of tampering with evidence and influencing witnesses. The prosecutor submitted that there were 1,23,086 applicants for the flood relief in 2018.
The funds were siphoned away by manipulating the beneficiary list provided by NIC Rebuild Ernakulam as well as manipulating the Bill Information Management System (BIMS) data of failed transactions in the treasury account. A detailed investigation is going on by scrutinising the master data, BIMS data and treasury payment data.
The extent of the offence can be ascertained only after completing the scrutiny. However, the investigation conducted so far has revealed misappropriation to the tune of `27,73,500. Since voluminous digital and hard copy documents have to be analysed and several persons have to be questioned, it would take several days to unearth the entire conspiracy behind the diversion of funds.