Balasore businessman held for embezzling Rs 6 crore in subsidies

BHUBANESWAR: A Balasore-based businessman was on Friday arrested for allegedly embezzling government subsidies to the tune of nearly Rs 6 crore on the pretext of selling agricultural machinery and equipment to farmers.
The accused was identified by the economic offences wing (EOW) of the state Crime Branch as Srinath Rana (48).
Rana, who used to work as a regional manager of Varushapriya Agrotech Private Limited, a Bangalore-based company, had misused the firm’s login ID and password to misappropriate the subsidy amount.
The company, having its branch office in Baramunda area here, had in January this year lodged a complaint with the Bharatpur police station. The EOW took over the investigation from the Bharatpur police on Wednesday.
Varushapriya Agrotech is an authorised supplier of paddy transplanters to farmers across the country and also delivers various services to the Odisha government under various subsidised schemes.
During his tenure as a regional manager in the company in 2018-2020, Rana was assigned the task of registering the sale of farm machinery and facilitating subsidies to the beneficiaries/farmers by accessing the state agriculture department’s website www.agrisnetodisha.ori.nic.in.
The cost of each paddy transplanter used to range between Rs 2.33 lakh and Rs 3 lakh then. The government was offering subsidies between Rs 93,320 and Rs 1.50 lakh on each machine.
According to the procedure, the farmers would first purchase farm machinery from the authorised dealer. The dealer would then upload the sale details, along with photos of the beneficiaries, on the government website after which the government would transfer the subsidy amount to the bank accounts of the farmers.
“During investigation, it was found that between 2017 and 2021, Rana, proprietor of M/s Tarini Auto Agency in Balasore, had fraudulently uploaded fake sale details of more than 500 paddy transplanters with fake engine and chassis numbers. He had also uploaded the names and photos of the fake beneficiaries from 18 districts on the direct benefit transfer portal of the government,” additional director general of police (Crime Branch) Sanjeeb Panda said.
Subsequently, the government had released the subsidy amount to the tune of about Rs 6 crore in favour of the farmers.
The subsidies were credited to the bank accounts of the farmers.
Rana had conspired with the poor farmers and paid them a few thousands of rupees before withdrawing the subsidy amounts from their accounts. “Rana had siphoned off government subsidies without the sale or purchase of any farm equipment,” Panda said. Though the farmers had illegally benefited from this arrangement, the EOW did not arrest them as they were lured by Rana, who paid them a few thousands of rupees.