The CBI probing the food grain scam in Uttar Pradesh raided the residential and commercial premises of a former minister Vinod Kumar Singh a.k.a. Pandit Singh in Gonda.
Pandit Singh is a senior Samajwadi Party leader and was minister for medical education in the Mulayam Singh government.
The raids continued till late in the night and the CBI team took possession of a number of documents. The foodgrain scam in Gonda itself is estimated to be worth over `457 crores. As many as 63 FIRs have been registered so far in the Sampurna Gramin Rojgar Guarantee Yojana section of the scam, which involves around 450 Class-I government officials and another 800 middle and lower-rung subordinates apart from some 10,000 private entities who joined hands to pocket some `35,000 crores.
The scam involved sale of food grain meant for the public distribution system and other special schemes for those BPL — Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana (now integrated with NREGS), Antyodaya Yojana and midday meal scheme — being sold off to private individuals and organisations while in the government records, the stocks were shown as “distributed” among the target beneficiaries.
The scam also included procurement of the same wheat in the name of stocks under the special schemes and again sold in black market for sale abroad. The scam, spread across five countries including Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, South Africa and Bhutan, along with 34 of the 71 districts in Uttar Pradesh, came to light from Gonda itself in 2003 when mass irregularities in distribution of food grain meant for the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna were detected.
Even before the then chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav could order a probe into the Gonda irregularities, the then MP from Lakhimpur lodged a complaint that foodgrain meant to be distributed to the poor free of cost or at subsidised rates through the PDS under various Central government schemes, was being sold in the open market.
Thereafter a string of cases of swindling of food grain was reported from all across the state, including Ballia, Sant Kabir Nagar, Lucknow, Barabanki and Jaunpur districts and it was found that in 31 districts, food grain worth crores was actually being sold in the open market and also siphoned off to neighboring countries, including Bangladesh and Nepal, through forged documents.
Vinod Kumar Singh’s relative Shiv Bax Singh is a partner in Suraj Rice Mill situated in Nawabganj area of Gonda — a mill that was a part of the scam.