Alleged embezzlement of Rs33.97m at NBP Chitral
Zulfiqar Ahmad
ISLAMABAD: Lower Chitral District Police Officer (DPO) Iftikhar Shah has launched an investigation against three police officials who allegedly embezzled an amount of Rs33.97 million in connivance with the manager of the National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) main branch Chitral.
The DPO confirmed the scam to ChitralToday and said he would not spare anyone involved in it, adding: “I would recover every single penny and have already recovered some of the amount.” He said a three-member investigation team headed by him was probing the matter. “Enough evidence against all the four persons, especially the NBP branch manager, has been gathered,” the DPO said.
According to official documents available with ChitralToday, the three police officials – head constable Fida Hussain, head constable Fazal Rabi and foot constable Muhammad Rahim – in connivance with the NBP Chitral main branch manager Amjad A. Sani allegedly pocketed the Rs33.97 million. The amount totalling 33,979,000 rupees had been received at the bank account of the Lower Chitral police chief in lieu of security provided to the under-construction Lawi hydopower project from 01/7/2021 to 30/06/2022.
From the DPO account, the amount was to be transferred through challans to the government treasury ie the district account office (DAO) account. However, the three policemen and the manager of the NBP Chitral withdrew the whole amount and allegedly embezzled it.
Under the standard operating procedure (SOP), the bank was bound to alert through a phone call the signatory, in this case the DPO, about the withdrawal of the huge amount from the account of the police.
However, the NBP branch manager, according to sources, did not follow the SOP, and after withdrawing the cash issued a receipt with the bank stamp on it (available with ChitralToday) dated February 7, 2023, that was submitted to the district account officer and the DPO offices by the police officials. The receipt later turned out to be fake as the amount was never reconciled at the treasury account.
Interestingly, the three policemen after producing the fake receipt also managed to get clearance from the District Accounts Officer’s office, taking advantage of power outages in the office at that time. The sources said the DAO office had initially okayed the receipt after seeing the bank stamp on it, which later turned out to be fake.
They said this left the DAO office with no option but to report non-reconciliation of the challan to the DPO, who launched an investigation.
When contacted by ChitralToday, the NBP branch manager denied his involvement, saying he needed to consult his legal team to comment on the issue any further.
The three policemen allegedly involved in the scam could not be reached for comments as they did not respond to calls made on their mobile phones.