Bhubaneswar, March 13: Superintendent of Keonjhar district jail Amiya Kumar Patnaik was suspended on charges of dereliction in duty in connection with a case about Dipak Gupta, the prime accused in the Rs 18,000-crore Uliburu mines scam.

Gupta, who had been lodged in jail, was found to have stayed in hotels instead of SCB Medical College and Hospital in Cuttack last month. He was taken to the health facility for treatment. Earlier, the administration had suspended four constables, who were supposed to have escorted him.

A team of vigilance officials today visited the jail, the hospitals and collected various records pertaining to Gupta’s stay in jail and outside. Additional director-general (prisons) Pradeep Kapoor said disciplinary proceedings would be initiated against the jail superintendent.

Gupta, an undertrial in Keonjhar jail, was taken to Cuttack for medical treatment. The accused, who is in his 40s, has spent 103 days out of his 167 days of incarceration at various hospitals. Last month, acting on a tip-off that Gupta was not staying at SCB, the police took him into custody. The health department ordered an inquiry into the role of hospital employees in allowing Gupta to step outside.

Doctors and other employees of the medical college are also being questioned regarding this.

On September 4 last year, the vigilance wing of state police nabbed Gupta after the accused had evaded arrest for nearly six months. The vigilance had filed charge sheet against Gupta and others in the Uliburu mining scam on January 3.

The Justice M.B. Shah Commission, which had probed into the mining scam in Odisha and elsewhere, in its report to the Centre last month, had said minerals worth over Rs 1,800 crore had been looted from the Uliburu mines.