Senior site engineers, Sourav Dey and Saptarsi Goswamy of Hindustan Steel Works Construction Limited (HSCL) were arrested on Monday for misappropriation of Government funds in construction of four 100- seated hostels for SC students in Subarnapur district under the ST and SC Development Department.
During raids by Vigilance Balangir, it was revealed that the Government of Odisha in ST and SC Development Department entered into an MoU with HSCL Ltd. for projects worth Rs 43.94 crore entrusting the execution of hostel buildings for SC/ST students in KBK districts to M/s HSCL Ltd. In turn, HSCL floated a number of tenders for the above projects. Of these, they entered into an agreement with Bijay Kumar Agrawal and his Power of Attorney holder Deepak Kumar Agrawal for construction of 12 hostel buildings with agreement value of Rs 8,12,30,877. This included four 100-seated hostel buildings for SC students in Subarnapur district with agreement value of Rs 2,71,24,207.
However, Dey and Goswamy failed to supervise the works executed by the contractors and, in connivance with them, facilitated release of payments and thereby allowed the contractors to execute substandard work and misappropriate Government funds, resulting in wrongful loss to the Government exchequer.