Four persons, including a ration shop salesman, have been arrested on charges of circulating more than 500 bogus ration cards at Vikramangalam, near Usilampatti, in Madurai District, officials said today.
They were rounded up following raids conducted by top Civil Supplies Department officials after receiving complaints about circulation of bogus cards, they said.
According to officials, they were inquiring into the role of some officials of the Civil Supplies Department in the circulation the bogus ration cards, for which supplies had been made leading to the loss of several lakhs of rupees.
"We strongly suspect that the officials have connived in the offence. There could be more arrests at the official level," said a top official on condition of anonymity.
The raid also revealed that many genuine persons did not receive their ration cards.
The Joint Commissioner of Civil Supplies Chandramohan had visited some of the shops early last week and intense audit was conducted in some ration shops suspected to have been allotted bogus ration cards.
Police arrested Singam, assistant secretary of the Vikramangalam Primary Cooperative Society, Ravi, salesman, and two others. All of them were remanded to judicial custody.
Meanwhile, in Sivaganga district, police seized 190 bags of ration rice and arrested three persons on charges of smuggling it.
Police, on a tip-off that ration rice was being smuggled from a shop at Maravamangalam, patrolled the area and intercepted a lorry transporting rice bags.
Three loadmen identified as Selvam, Saravanan and Periyasamy, who were travelling on the lorry, have been arrested.
They confessed that the PDS rice was being taken from a shop at Maravamangalam to Karaikudi.
The lorry driver managed to escape. A case has been registered
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