News Madhya Pradesh Fake bills worth Rs 58 crore submitted to Indore Municipal Corp without laying drainage lines, 11 held

Fake bills worth Rs 58 crore submitted to Indore Municipal Corp without laying drainage lines, 11 held

Indore, the cleanest city in India for the last seven years, has found itself embroiled in the latest scam involving the Municipal Corporation. Contractors submitted fake bills totaling Rs. 58 crore and received payment of Rs. 34 crore without actually laying the drainage lines.

Representative Image Image Source : ANIRepresentative Image

In a shocking expose of an alleged scam, Indore police arrested 11 persons in a case related to submission of fake bills in the city's civic body on Monday. 

According to police officials, a scam of allegedly presenting fake bills of around Rs 58 crore to the Indore Municipal Corporation has come to light. The bills were submitted for a work of laying drainage lines. However, there was no drainage line laid

The police also said that bills worth Rs 34 crore out of the total amount have already been paid by the civic body of India’s cleanest city. So far 6 contractors have been arrested. Surprisingly, the scam also involved the government employees of the corporation. Apart from 6 contractors, five government employees have also been arrested in this connection, the police said.

Giving details of the case, Deputy Commissioner of Police Pankaj Kumar Pandey told the media about the developments so far. The official further said an amount of Rs 70 lakh deposited into the bank accounts of the accused has been frozen and details of their properties are being collected for the action of attachment.

Team investigating and searching five absconding accused

He also informed that a 12-member police team is investigating other bank accounts and lockers of the accused. Another police official stated that among the five arrested government employees, one is an executive engineer. As a total of 11 accused have been arrested, search for five other absconding contractors in on.

Notably, Indore has retained the title of cleanest city in India for the 7 time in a row. Earlier in January this year, President Droupadi Murmu gave the awards to the winners at the Swachh Survekshan Award-2023 ceremony held in New Delhi. According to the data, 4,447 urban local bodies participated in the Swachh Survekshan 2023 and 12 core citizen responses were received. The government claims it to be the world's largest cleanliness survey.

(With PTI Inputs)

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