The Odisha government terminated the services of senior IAS officer Binod Kumar after he was proven guilty in corruption cases. The Centre has approved the state government’s proposal to give him compulsory retirement.
Kumar is accused of resorting to unfair means to sanction funds as the Managing Director of the Odisha Rural Housing Development Corporation (ORHDC) after the Super Cyclone hit the coastal state in 1999.
Binod Kumar had illegally approved Rs 33.34 crore to various fake firms and individuals, resulting in huge financial losses to the state government. The Odisha government filed 26 prudent cases against him.
Kumar also defied various norms in disbursing loans to NGO Gramya Vikash Manch owned by Ashish Kumar Nayak during his tenure at the corporation in 2000-01. Loans were disbursed by ORHDC to the NGO to set up a Rural Building Centre in Balipatna area for reconstructing houses hit by the 1999 cyclone.
Kumar was immediately suspended after the corruption charges came forward in 2001. He was reinstated later and was serving as the officer on special duty in the higher education department at the time of his dismissal. In 2018, a special vigilance court convicted Kumar in the housing scam and sentenced him to three years in jail for financial irregularities involving Rs 1.02 crore.
