Bhubaneswar, Dec. 21: An employee of the water resources department and a bank official were arrested for allegedly taking a Rs 50 lakh loan through fraud.

The Bhubaneswar vigilance division today arrested Pratap Gouda, 50, stenographer to the engineer in chief of the water resources department and the field officer of Odisha State Co-operative Bank, Prabhat kumar Jena, 49, for the fraud committed in 2009.

Vigilance officials said both the accused, in association with the establishment officer of the chief engineer's office (drainage division), Cuttack, Rabindra Kumar Jena, had forged documents of 12 persons to secure the loan. Jena was arrested in 2013.

"All the accused prepared documents of beneficiaries claiming to be the employees of the drainage division and took the loan. Rabindra Kumar had been arrested by the crime branch for a similar offence," said superintendent of police, Bhubaneswar vigilance division, Basanta Kumar Panigrahi.

Kumar had earlier been arrested by the economic offences wing of the state crime branch for a bank fraud worth Rs 2 crore. It was alleged that his aides had withdrawn loans ranging between Rs 2.5 lakh and Rs 3 lakh each meant for 80 beneficiaries from the Gandarpur branch of a nationalised bank under the Sarala Loan Scheme in 2009 by impersonating employees of the chief engineer's office (drainage division), Cuttack.

CBI raid

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) today conducted raids on Rightmax Technotrade International Limited (RTIL), a money deposit collection company, which allegedly duped investors of Rs 100 crore in Odisha, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

CBI officials said that the raids were conducted at four places in Tamil Nadu and many locations in Ganjam district of Odisha, including the residence Rabindra Kumar Jena, one of the directors of the firm, at Kabisurya Nagar in Ganjam district.

CBI sources said the firm started its operations in Bangalore in April 2010 and subsequently expanded its business to Odisha and Tamil Nadu.

"Though the firm collected crores of rupees from investors, it collected just Rs 30 lakh in Odisha. Most of the duped investors in the state belonged to Ganjam," said a CBI official.

Jail sentence

The Special Judge, Special Court, Bhubaneswar today convicted Nrusinga Charan Sahoo, the deputy manager (mining) of Odisha Mining Corporation and sentenced him to 30 months riogorous imprisonment and a fine of Rs 2 lakh. The vigilance had lodged a disproportionate assets case against him in 2008 for possession of assets worth Rs 5.1 lakh.