Bhubaneswar, March 18 The Odisha Vigilance Department arrested a bank official on Wednesday for allegedly embezzling over ₹5 crore in government funds, along with his father, officials said.
The accused is the branch head of a small finance bank in Bhadrak district, Odisha, they said.
The fraud targeted the office of the Block Education Officer (BEO) in Korei, Jajpur, resulting in a total loss of ₹5.56 crore, the department said in a statement.
During the investigation, vigilance officers found that the accused committed the fraud with the help of his father, who is a retired headmaster and was re-employed at the BEO in Korei, it said.
His father illegally accessed the Human Resource Management System (HRMS) and targeted the IDs of 13 retired teachers, the statement said.
The fraud spanned nearly six years, from November 2018 to September 2024, which was detected during an audit, it said.
The father of the accused is currently at large, and efforts are underway to apprehend him, it added.