Odisha Legal Metrology Official Arrested By Vigilance

Rourkela: Vigilance sleuths on Tuesday arrested assistant controller of Legal Metrology, Rourkela, Bidyadhar Biswal, on charges of amassing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income.

The move came a couple of hours after the anti-corruption department officials unearthed disproportionate assets worth over Rs 1 crore from his office and houses on the second day of simultaneous raids.

During raids, properties including six plots in the name of Bidyadhar and his relatives worth over Rs 18 lakh, gold ornaments, amounting to Rs 17 lakh, and bank deposits of more than Rs 10 lakh were detected.

A car, one Bullet and a Scooty were also seized during the raid.

However, Bidyadhar refuted the allegation and claimed that the properties are self-earned. He further said gold ornaments detected during raids, belong to his wife.

On Monday, a 25-member vigilance team, including three DSPs of the anti-corruption department, had carried out simultaneous raids on Biswal’s office at Uditnagar in Sundargarh district and his residence at Pokhariput and relative’s house at Patrapada in Bhubaneswar.

The team also searched his ancestral house at Nimikheta in Khurda district.

Following raids, several documents and papers were verified.