Odisha police summon ex-IAS officer V.K. Pandian over missing inquiry reports

Odisha Police Summon Ex-IAS Officer Pandian Over Missing Inquiry Files

Bharatmorningnews.com – Odisha police summon ex IAS officer V.K. Pandian to answer questions about two crucial inquiry reports that have gone missing from the state government’s records. The documents, which relate to the 2008 Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati murder case and the 2016 SUM Hospital fire, reportedly vanished from the chief minister’s office, according to government sources confirmed on Wednesday.

The Capital Police station in Bhubaneswar has issued an official notice directing Pandian to appear before the assistant commissioner of police for Zone-I. He is scheduled to present himself at 11 am on July 25 to provide his explanation regarding the missing files.

A 2000-batch IAS officer, Pandian previously served as private secretary to former Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik. After choosing voluntary retirement from civil service, he joined the opposition Biju Janata Dal (BJD) ahead of the 2024 national and state elections. Following the party’s electoral defeat, Pandian withdrew from active political life.

Investigation Expands to Include Other Officials

The summons against Pandian is part of a wider probe into the disappearance of the Justice A.S. Naidu Commission report on the 2008 killing of Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and his assistants. The second document is the Revenue Divisional Commissioner’s inquiry report concerning the 2016 SUM Hospital fire in Bhubaneswar.

Earlier this month, police had also sent notices to former IT secretary Manoj Mishra and IAS officer Rajesh Verma. While Mishra attended and gave his statement to investigators, Verma failed to appear despite being asked to do so by Wednesday morning, officials said.

Last month, the Odisha home department registered a First Information Report (FIR) against unnamed individuals under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS). The charges include criminal breach of trust by a public servant, destruction or concealment of official documents, and criminal conspiracy.

According to the FIR filed by Home department joint secretary Sarat Chandra Marandi, repeated searches failed to locate the two inquiry reports in official records.

Swami Laxmanananda and four of his disciples were shot dead by Maoists at his ashram in Kandhamal district on August 23, 2008. The killings triggered one of Odisha’s worst episodes of communal violence, in which at least 38 people died and hundreds of homes and places of worship were destroyed.

The SUM Hospital fire in October 2016 killed 24 people after smoke spread through the intensive care, dialysis and emergency units of the private medical college and hospital in Bhubaneswar.

The FIR notes that the missing reports hold significance because several other official files and reports sent to the Chief Minister’s Office were returned to the Home department on June 4, 2024, when election results indicated a change of government in Odisha, but the two inquiry reports were not.

The circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the reports, particularly when other files from the same period were returned, create a reasonable suspicion that they may have been intentionally removed, retained, concealed, destroyed or otherwise unlawfully dealt with, the FIR said.

About the Correspondent

Debabrata Mohanty serves as a senior assistant editor of Hindustan Times and works as state correspondent from Odisha. He has been covering the state’s politics, governance, public policy, natural disasters, environment and its society for close to three decades.

With his long years of reporting from the state capital of Bhubaneswar, Mohanty has been known as one of the most experienced and credible journalists covering Odisha for the national English dailies. His reporting combines on-ground detail with deep institutional knowledge detailing the state’s changing politics, governance issues, administrative reforms and the functioning of its public institutions.