Rs 8-crore flood relief deposited in accounts of 326 ineligible people

Kochi: In a strange development, the Ernakulam district administration has detected itself that it had deposited over Rs 8 crore in the bank accounts of 326 people ineligible to receive this much disaster relief, in the aftermath of August 2018 floods.

Each person received Rs 2.5 lakh in their bank accounts, and the district administration blames it on a technical fault.

In a damage control exercise on Friday, district collector K. Mohammed Y. Safirulla issued a press release saying that the excess amount in these accounts has been frozen and in the case of people who have withdrawn the amount, revenue recovery proceedings will be initiated through village officers to recover the amount.

The district collector had earlier written to Union Bank of India, the lead bank in the district, to freeze such bank accounts.

A senior district administration official said that the National Informatics Centre (NIC) had handled the technical aspect of the transfer of money to the accounts.

The district collector told DC on Saturday that the defect was detected in an internal audit and the NIC has been asked to find out how it happened.

The official said that there were four slabs in disaster relief distribution with people eligible for Rs 10,000, Rs 60,000, Rs 1.25 lakh and Rs 2.50 lakh.

"Some of the people in the first three groups too received Rs 2.50 lakh," the official said.

Money has been deposited in the account of 67,000 eligible people in these four slabs. The money was mainly distributed to people who suffered damages to their houses, mostly in North Paravur and Aluva areas.

It is learnt that the district collector has ordered revenue recovery to get back the amount since the bank authorities expressed their helplessness.