Odisha Principal Accountant General Amar Patnaik, whose reports on land allotment scam had rubbed state bureaucrats and politicians the wrong way, has been unceremoniously transferred to Kerala, a month after his promotion.
Patnaik, an officer of Indian Audit and Accounts Services, had kicked up a storm in the state as he led his team of auditors to dig up the land allotment scam.
Last year, he had exposed the scam in allotment of land and houses in Bhubaneswar to ministers, IAS, IPS, IFS officers, businessmen and journalists under discretionary quota. Following his report, the government set up a task force that recommended cancellation of all such allotment.
Last year too, his report shown how the state-owned Orissa Industrial Infrastructure Development Corporation allowed private companies to mortgage leased land for raising loans from banks in violation of Land Acquisition Act. In a recent report, his auditors had exposed how premium government land in Bhubaneswar were allotted to influential people including BJD ministers at highly concessional rates for building palatial homes, hostel, banks, ATM centre and schools.
Although Patnaik had sought at least one more year in Orissa due to his daughter’s examination, his request was not accepted. Official sources said a group of influential bureaucrats were sore over his audit into functioning of Bhubaneswar-Cuttack police commissionerate system. The audit report is now lying with CAG officer in Delhi for final vetting. Recently, he stirred a hornest’s nest by seeking details of the income and expenditure of the Lord Jagannath temple administration from 2009 till 2015, for audit.
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Prasanta Patnaik