NEW DELHI, Oct 23 (AFP): More than three million dollars donated to the Indian prime minister's relief fund for victims of disasters such as the Asian tsunami and Kashmir earthquake are missing, reports said Tuesday.
The hole in the accounts came to light when the office of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh investigated a private petition filed under the 2005 Right to Information Act, the NDTV news channel reported.
Mujibur Rehman, an employee of the state-run Coal India Limited (CIL), filed the petition last year, NDTV said.
Rehman donated money to the fund along with thousands of his colleagues in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami that killed 10,000 and left millions homeless in southern India.
A subsequent inquiry found that 120 million rupees (three million dollars) collected by CIL for several disasters including the 2005 Kashmir quake had been diverted or not yet deposited into the relief fund.
Also, of a total of 103 million rupees (2.5 million dollars) CIL collected for the 2004 tsunami, some three million rupees or 75,000 dollars was still missing.
Officials in Singh's office said they were aware of the story but had no immediate comment.
With the findings out in the open, Rehman told NDTV that he now feared for his life.
"I cannot file a case against them (CIL). I have to be careful when I leave home. They have done a breach of trust by holding the funds," he said.
India is notorious for corruption.
Ordinary Indians pay some 4.6 billion dollars in bribes each year to obtain basic services such as water and electricity, according to a study by anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International.
Indian PM's relief fund missing millions of dollars
FE Team | Published: October 24, 2007 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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