CM orders FIR against nine forest staffers in Ambala NREGA scam

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 27

Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar today ordered the registration of an FIR against nine officers and officials of the Forest Department in the alleged Rs 4.99-crore scam under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) in Ambala district.  The matter had been lingering for many years.

Accepting the recommendations of Director-General, State Vigilance Bureau, the Chief Minister has ordered the registration of cases against the then Divisional Forest Officer (T) Ambala Jagmohan Sharma, Range Forest Officer, Ambala, Gokul Sharma; Range Forest Officer, Naraingarh, Rajesh Rana; Range Forest Officers of Saha—Prashant Sharma, Vinod Kumar, Lakshman Das and Deepak Alavadi, Deputy Superintendent, Office of the DFO, Ambala (T) Chander Mohan, and Surender Kumar Nagar, Assistant to the then Accounts Officer, office of the Chief Conservator of Forest, Panchkula, .

Apart from registering the FIR, departmental action would also be initiated against the officers and officials under Section 7 and Rs 16, 62,080 recovered from them.

As per the records, it had come to light that officials responsible for the implementation of the NREGA had allegedly embezzled Rs 30 crore from the centrally sponsored scheme for youths residing in rural areas.
Two inquiries were conducted by the then Additional Deputy Commissioners of Ambala. While the demand for handing over the investigations to the CBI was turned down by the then CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the investigations were handed over to the State Vigilance Bureau in 2010.   The officials concerned allegedly manipulated the documents and showed that several development works had been undertaken in the rural areas on which the funds were spent while scrutiny of the documents and the actual works undertaken revealed otherwise.