Eight officials of a state-owned cooperative bank in Odisha have been punished for their involvement in financial frauds, Cooperation Department Secretary Bishnupada Sethi said Saturday.
Six officials have been dismissed from service, while two were demoted. They were found to be involved in fraud, misappropriation and dishonesty in the Odisha State Cooperative Bank (OSCB), Sethi told IANS.
Those who lost their jobs are: deputy general managers Satyanarayan Panda and Bhaskar Chandra Hota, assistant general manager Nimain Chand Jena, managers B.B. Senapati and Himanshu Sekhar Das and junior assistant Sarat Chandra Jena, he said.
Two officials who were demoted are Debabrata Ghosh and Harihar Mallick. While Ghosh has been demoted from assistant general manager to manager, Mallik has been demoted from manager to assistant manager, he said.
"A fraud of a total of Rs.70 crore was committed by them during last five years. The cases are being investigated by the economic offence wing of the crime branch police and vigilance department," Sethi said.
The OSCB is a Rs.12,000 crore state-supported cooperative bank which has been rewarded by the national level organisations from time to time for its professional approach and the performance par excellence.
"The erring employees were responsible for tarnishing the image of this organization", he said.
"These exemplary punishment would emit a signal to all other employees in the cooperative credit structure not to resort to fraudulent activities in a banking organization," said Sethi who is also the bank's management-in-charge.
