Odisha Govt Axes Three Corrupt Officials

Bhubaneswar: The state government compulsory retired three officials for corruption on Thursday.

The three officers are Divisonal Forest Officer (DFO) Sudhanshu Sekhar Mishra, Executive Engineer, Angul Rural Works Quality Control Division, Prana Krushna Prasad and Deputy Executive Engineer, Tusra (R&B) Sub-Division-1, Umesh Chandra Tripathy.

Mishra was posted as divisional forest officer (DFO), Athagarh in 2016.

The state vigilance had booked him for acquiring disproportionate assets in his and his family’s name worth more than Rs. 5.5 crore.

In the highest seizure of cash from a government servant in Odisha, Vigilance sleuths had found more than Rs 1 crore during a raid at his house. Dubbed as the most corrupt forest officer, Mishra had also stashed Rs 3.46 crore in fixed deposits, bank savings and shares.

He was arrested and subsequently suspended.

Prasad was booked for demanding and accepting illegal gratification. He was caught taking bribe in June 2015 by the Cuttack Vigilance and by the Bhubaneswar Vigilance in November 2018.

The Koraput Vigilance had registered four cases against Tripathy for showing undue official favour to a contractor, misappropriation of government money by recording inflated measurements and possession of assets disproportionate to his known sources of income.