UP Home Guard salary fraud: Divisional commandant among 5 arrested

Five Home Guard officials, including a divisional commandant, have been arrested for their alleged role in the fraudulent withdrawal of salaries of the force personnel, police said on Wednesday.

Their arrest comes a day after muster rolls (attendance logs) of all home guard personnel were found burnt in a box inside the office of the Gautam Buddh Nagar district commandant office of the Home Guard in Greater Noida.

Attendance logs of all the personnel since 2014 in the district were found destroyed in the fire amid an ongoing investigation into the salary fraud, prompting Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to intervene.

Senior Superintendent of Police, Gautam Buddh Nagar, Vaibhav Krishna said five accused have been arrested for their suspected role in the salary scam.

"Home Guards' present Divisional Commandant Ram Narayan Chaurasia, who has earlier served as district commandant in Gautam Buddh Nagar, Assistant Company Commander Satish, and Platoon commanders Montu, Satveer and Shailendra have been arrested in the salary scam case," he said.

Krishna said the five suspects have detailed the modus operandi of the fraud to police and further details will be made public later on Wednesday.

Earlier in July, it came to light that salaries of scores of home guards deployed here were withdrawn despite them showing up for work only half of the time during May and June, prompting officials to launch a probe into the matter.

About Rs 7.5 lakh were withdrawn in salaries of these home guards, who reported on duty for only 50 per cent of the time while their attendance was marked for the entire period, officials said, suspecting the fraud could be in crores.

An FIR was lodged against Home Guard officials for fraud and forgery over the fraudulent withdrawal of salaries of the force's personnel on November 13.

The first information report (FIR) was lodged under Indian Penal Code Sections 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant, or by banker, merchant or agent), 420 (fraud), 467, 468 and 471 (all three related to forgery of documents).

Part of the auxiliary force, the home guards are not permanent employees and are recruited on a casual basis. They do not have any fixed monthly salary and are paid based on the number of days of duty. There are about 375 home guards, including 10 women, deployed in Gautam Buddh Nagar.

A maximum 50 of them are attached with traffic police, while 10-15 home guards are deployed at each of the 23 police stations across Noida and Greater Noida, according to the officials.