Bank Customers’ Deposits In Kiosk Go ‘Missing’ In Odisha’s Balasore

Balasore: Several customers of State Bank of India (SBI) have allegedly been duped of their deposits of lakhs of rupees by a couple in Odisha’s Balasore district.

According to sources, people of Kansa and its nearby villages under Nilagari block had given their hard-earned money to the couple running the kiosk of the SBI branch there as deposit in the bank. The bank had reportedly outsourced some of its transaction to the couple.

The matter of missing deposits of the customers from their accounts came to light when one of them, Jayanti Sahu of Durgapur village wanted to withdraw money on the maturity of her fixed deposit account in the bank. When the bank officials started the process of closure of the account, they found that there was zero balance and accordingly informed Jayanti.

But she claimed that she had saved Rs 1 lakh in two instalments in the bank’s kiosk and wanted to withdraw the money after the end of maturity period of one year for her daughter’s marriage. This led other depositors to enquire about their accounts and faced the same situation.

They told the media persons that whenever they used to go to the bank branch to deposit money, the officials would direct them to the kiosk. They did not find anything suspicious about it until the case of Jayanti came to light. They also alleged that when they approached the branch manager of the bank, but he did not come to their help.

When contacted, the bank manager admitted that the deposits of some depositors are missing and said they were looking into the matter.

Meanwhile, the couple, who were running the kiosk, are absconding and the villagers were planning to complain to the police about their missing deposits from the SBI kiosk.