Samurdhi officers nabbed over loan swindle

Yasaratne GAMGE

Fifteen Samurdhi officers including three Samurdhi bank officers in Nuwara Eliya were dismissed from service for allegedly swindling Rs 9,800,000 from the Nuwara Eliya Samurdhi Bank, on the pretext of issuing loans to Samurdhi beneficiaries, the Police said.

The mass scale deception was uncovered when the Nuwara Eliya District Secretariat Audit branch examined a recurring deficit in loan accounts and figured that it was due to unpaid loans by Samurdhi beneficiaries who had obtained loans from the Nuwara Eliya Samurdhi Bank since 2005.

The debtors were informed via letters to pay back due amounts, but there was no response from them. Investigators then found that some of the persons to whom letters were addressed, were already dead while some did not exist.

Officers who handled the relevant sections in the bank were interdicted and further investigations continued.

Investigations revealed that three Samurdhi bank officers together with several other Samurdhi officers had themselves applied for loans using duplicate applications posing as Samurdhi beneficiaries and received the loans.