MARGAO
With police investigation into the theft of Rs 50,000 from the Margao Municipality hitting a dead end, Margao Municipal Councilor Mahesh Amonkar has on Monday demanded that the Chief Officer recover the amount from the concerned market inspector from whose table the cash had gone missing.
Margao Municipal Chairperson Damu Shirodkar has agreed with the demand made by Councilor Amonkar, saying he would request the Chief Officer Gaurish Sankhwalkar to recover the amount at the earliest.
Addressing the media, Councilor Amonkar pointed out that it’s now 4-5 months since the cash was stolen from the drawer of the concerned market inspector. “Police investigations into the matter has not yielded any result till date. But, this is public money and the audit will raise queries over the missing cash. In the fitness of things, the Chief Officer should institute recovery proceedings to recover the amount from the market inspector”, he demanded.
He added: “If the police subsequently detects the case by zeroing in on the accused involved in the theft, the amount recovered from the market inspector can then be refunded back to the employee”.
Pointing out that amount stolen from the MMC is public money, Amonkar said a bad precedent will be set in the Civic body if the amount if not recovered from the concerned employee. “Tomorrow cash amounting to lakhs of rupees may go missing”, he said, demanding to know whether the Civic body will keep quite and not recover the money from the employee.
MMC Chairperson Damu Shirodkar has agreed with the demand made by Amonkar, saying he would immediately request the Chief Officer to start the recovery proceedings. Shirodkar pointed out that though the CCTV cameras had captured a suspicious looking person in the corridors of the Civic body, the accused could not be identified.
“I will ensure that the Chief officer take the matter to the logical conclusion by recovering the amount of Rs 50,000”, the Chairperson added.
The amount had gone missing from the drawer of the table occupied by the market inspector during morning hours. Sources said the market inspector had kept the amount of Rs 50,000 in his drawer before going to another section after being called by a superior officer.
Incidentally, the CCTV camera focused towards the table of the market inspector was not functioning at the time of the incident.
