Hingoli: Officials booked for Rs 33 lakh PDS scam

On Tuesday night, twenty people, including the tehsildar Gajanan Shinde, three employees, and 16 fair price shop owners were booked for a scam involving food grains worth more than Rs 33 lakh, meant for the public distribution system (PDS).

The employees booked for the scam committed between January 2021 and July 2021 are Kailash Waghmare, B. B. Khadse, and Imran Pathan. The scam has caused quite a stir among officials of the food and civil supplies here.

As per norms, it is necessary to distribute food grains through online machines, but some fair price owners distributed them offline. Besides, many shop owners were given extra stock of food grains than the sanctioned limit during the said period. Those who received less stock of food grains complained to the district magistrate, Ruchesh Jayavanshi, who formed a committee to investigate the matter.

Accordingly, the committee submitted its report to the district magistrate, who forwarded it to the ministry concerned.

The district administration then ordered recovery of the extra food grains from fair price owners. Barring 16 shop owners, all those who had received extra stock food grains deposited their value.

Following a complaint filed by probationary tehsildar Himalay Ghorpade, a case was registered against 20 people, including the then tehsildar, three employees and 16 erring shop owners. The police are investigating further.