Official alleges Rs 100 cr scam during predecessor's term

A top bureaucrat in the state today alleged large scale misappropriation by another senior IAS officer during her tenure as Director General of the Administrative Training Institute (ATI), Mysore.

Releasing a 29-page report she had sent to the government, making allegations against Amita Prasad, when she was the ATI Director General (DG), present DG Rashmi V Mahesh, who is also the regional commissioner, at a press meet today, she said there had been misappropriation from giving cash for training programmes, catering contracts to panchayat fund.

The report sent to the chief secretary yesterday alleges financial irregularities and misappropriation by Prasad and five others of the ATI between 2008 and 2014 and contains details of the misappropriation. Rashmi Mahesh has sought a probe by CBI or Lok Ayukta. The extent of misappropriation is alleged to be Rs 100 crore.

The five others implicated are Deputy Director R Nagaraj, Warden Sarveshwar, Joint Director (in-charge) Prakash, Sr System Analyst Nagendra (Outsourcing) and Assistant Executive Engineer Rajashekharappa.   

Events in the ATI took a swift turn today after a senior employee of the ATI died under mysterious circumstances and his family members and a few others assaulting Rashmi Mahesh yesterday, a senior IAS officer.

Police Commissioner M A Saleem announced the suspension of Nazarbad Sub-Inspector Narendra Babu for dereliction of duty and issual of a memo to Inspector K C Poovaiah. He said at a press meet, 19 persons, including relatives of deceased Venkatesh, who was the mess manager of the ATI, whose body was found in the ATI sump yesterday, had been taken into custody.

While expressing her deep regret at the death of Venkatesh, the DG alleged that the police had “failed to act when some persons attacked her at the ATI yesterday at the behest of Additional Director General of Police-Intelligence (ADGP) A M Prasad, who is the husband of Amita Prasad.”

She denied the allegations of the family members of the deceased Venkatesh and their supporters that she was harassing Venkatesh as totally baseless, malicious and aimed at tarnishing her image. Venkatesh had been made a victim of by vested interests, Rashmi Mahesh alleged.

In her letter to the Chief Secretary, she said after taking charge as ATI DG on July 7, 2014, she had “come across several irregularities, misuse of public funds, misappropriation of funds, misuse of office, violation of KTPP Act and canons of financial propriety which have caused loss to public funds, to ATI, SIRD and SIUD and immense gains to certain staff of ATI and certain private entities during 2008-2014.”

She had reported the same to the government through letters and had sought an “independent enquiry through the Lok Ayukta or the Central Bureau of Investigation into the tenure and actions of Amita Prasad (2008-2014) which had caused a loss of public funds to the institute and gains to several private entities.” The report listed the irregularities committed during the period.

Referring to the death of Venkatesh under unnatural circumstances, Rashmi Mahesh said, he was “helping us understand many intricacies of the Bharani Contract and many loopholes”. “It is very unfortunate that an official who was sincere and against whom no action had been initiated has been made a victim by the vested interests.”

She described the attack on her as pre-meditated and alleged: “The police aided and abetted the attack on me with their sheer indifference and failure to protect a public servant on duty.”