An 11-crore mid-day meal scheme scam was unearthed in the Balrampur district of Uttar Pradesh, leading to the arrest of five individuals, state police said on Thursday.
FIR in the case names 45 people, which also includes a village head and an assistant teacher. The complaint was filed by the district Basic Siksha Adhikari at the city police station on Thursday, alleging over Rs 11 crore scam by manipulation of government records for the mid-day meal programme, Superintendent of Police (SP) Vikas Kumar informed.
Those arrested include Firoz Ahmad, Ashok Kumar (headmaster), Naseem Ahmad (village head), Mohammad Ahmedul Qadri (committee president) and Malik Munawwar (assistant teacher).
The fraud was committed by tampering with Excel sheets generated on the department's IVRS portal, which records the number of students enrolled in schools, cites the complaint. Based on these numbers, the government provide funds.
After the district magistrate’s approval, the sanctioned Excel sheet should be uploaded on the concerned portal for direct transfer to school accounts. However, instead of uploading the original document, the accused allegedly inflated amounts for select schools and reduced funds for others, ensuring that the total amount remained unchanged and thus escaped suspicion and detection safely.
As per the police statement, these extra funds, which were transferred to the favoured schools, were withdrawn and shared among the headmasters, village heads and school management committee presidents involved.
The police are looking at more arrests in the scam, said the SP, saying that further investigation is underway.
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