Guwahati, March 24: Dispur has requested the CBI to probe a multi-crore rupee scam in the 10th Assam Police Battalion after finding prima facie evidence against 14 officers.

Forest minister Rockybul Hussain told the Assembly today in reply to a question by AGP legislator Phani Bhusan Choudhury that the government made the request exactly a week ago.

Hussain said deputy inspector-general of police R.K. Bania, who is investigating the case, mentioned in his interim report to the director-general of police that as much as Rs 15 crore — the exact figure in the document is Rs 15,85,92,732 — was misappropriated between 2001 and 2003.

The minister, who was replying to Choudhury’s question on chief minister Tarun Gogoi’s behalf, said the fraud was perpetrated by drawing a salary in excess of the actual pay of employees of the police battalion and sometimes against fictitious names.

In his interim report, a copy of which was tabled in the Assembly, Bania said prima facie cases were established for investigation against officials responsible for drafting and signing the bills and making payments against these through the treasury.

The officials against whom cases have been established include two IPS officers, Jiban Singh and Paresh Chandra Neog. They were commandants of the 10th battalion during the period under investigation.

The other officers are H.K. Medhi, Randeep Barua, L. Choudhury, Akshay Saikia, Tapan Das, Tarpan Das, Paresh Das, Bulu Roy, Manoj Roy, Leela Boro, Keshab Chandra Kalita and Gopal Krishna Goswami. All of them have since retired.

After examining the bill registers, cashbooks, cheques and acquaintance rolls, Bania deduced that there was a missing link. He said in his report that the amounts released through pay cheques were without any reference to the acquaintance rolls.

He also noticed that one official had been identified in the records by two names and cheques released to both, as if they were different persons. There was also no mention of the acquaintance roll particulars in the pay cheque or in the disbursement register.

Hussain said the scam was deep-rooted and that Bania’s findings merited an investigation of the Dispur treasury staff who received and released a bill for Rs 15,30,175 without the signature of the authorised officer in the transit register.

Bania also mentioned in his interim report that pay bills of 609 and 331 constables were not available for April and May 2001 respectively. Bills pertaining to payments made to 217 constable in April 2002 were not found either.

Bania said “vital” records were not found for inspection and that the commandant of the battalion verbally informed him about several senior officers being aware of this.

He said this necessitated interrogation of two of the officials who handled records during the period under investigation.