COIMBATORE: A hostel owner lodged a complaint at the Peelamedu Police Station that she was swindled off Rs 8 lakh by the hostel warden, who let in around 20 unregistered tenants and collected money from them, without informing her.
M Prabavathy (37) of Nehru Nagar in Kalapatty Road, who runs a ladies’ hostel in the area appointed R Arthi (24) of Lalgudi in Tiruchy district as the hostel’s warden, in November 2023. When Arthi joined as the warden, only 70 ladies were staying.
Since then, Arthi had recorded a mere 16 new admissions to the hostel till August 12 this year, taking the total tally to 86. When Prabavathy questioned Arthi about the poor admission in the hostel, the latter failed to provide a proper response.
Given this, Prabavathy has asked Arti to hand over the account and registration details of the hostel to her at once. However the latter evaded her by saying she would submit the details later.
Feeling suspicious, Prabvathy visited the hostel on August 12, where she found a total of 105 hostellers staying on the premises and of them, 19 hostellers were staying off the record, without completing any registration work.
After inquiring with the hostellers, Prabavathy found that Arthi had let some of the hostellers reside here without conducting a proper registration process. Sources also said that Arthi had collected unaccounted fee payments to the tune of about Rs 8 lakh from the hostellers. The latter lodged a complaint against the hostel warden at the Peelamedu Police Station. Police have filed a case.