One more staffer of Thiruvananthapuram city corporation, who was allegedly involved in the corruption in revenue tax collection was arrested by the city police on Saturday. The arrested is S Sunitha, cashier of Nemom corporation zonal office. She was taken into custody by the Nemom police from her residence near Nemom.
Sunitha is involved in embezzling around Rs 26.7 lakh along with zonal office superintendent S Shanthi. This is the major fund scam reported at a zonal office. However, Shanthi is still at large as she is reportedly trying to secure an anticipatory bail. A total of seven staff of three zonal offices - Nemom, Sreekaryam, and Attipra are involved in the scam to the tune of Rs 33.96 lakh. So far, the police arrested two staff members. On Wednesday, the Sreekaryam police arrested the office attendant Biju of the Sreekaryam zonal office. Nemom, Sreekaryam, and Kazhakootam police are on the lookout for the remaining five staff who are involved in the corruption and cheating of people by collecting money from them in the name of building tax collection and various fees for certificates.
However, BJP councillors who have been staging day and night protests for the past 17 days inside the corporation council hall will continue their protest demanding the arrest of the other five staff. According to M R Gopan, Opposition leader, the first arrest was recorded as a fallout of strong protests by the councilors. “Though the arrest attributes the success of our protests, we will continue the protest till all the staff involved in the scam are arrested,’’ Gopan said.
All of the seven staff were earlier suspended by the city corporation after the Kerala State Audit Department’s concurrent audit found that money received as taxes was misappropriated by the employees of the Nemom, Sreekaryamand Attipra zonal offices of the corporation.
The fraud was first detected at the Sreekaryam office. Two staff, office attendant Biju and bill collector Anil are accused of diverting Rs 5.04 lakh from the Sreekaryam office. Later, similar fraud was reported at Nemom and Attipra zonal offices. The staff of the Sreekaryam office had reportedly used two challans instead of one while depositing the daily collection at the bank.