Kendrapada: Vigilance officials on Thursday nabbed Chandrajit Parija, programmer in the office of district education officer-cum-district project coordinator (DEO-cum-DPC), Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), Jagatsinghpur, while allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 30,000 from an executant for facilitating the release of pending bills.Vigilance sources said Parija demanded the bribe for clearing bills related to the installation of digital blackboards in schools across Jagatsinghpur district. As a member of the procurement and technical committee, he was responsible for inspecting the installation work and certifying it, following which the bills were to be released in favour of the executant.The complainant allegedly approached Parija several times seeking inspection of the completed work. However, instead of taking steps to inspect the work, Parija allegedly demanded Rs 30,000 for processing and clearing the pending bills. Following the alleged demand, the complainant reported the matter to the vigilance authorities.Acting on the complaint, Odisha Vigilance laid a trap and caught Parija while he was allegedly accepting the bribe from the complainant on Thursday. The entire tainted amount was seized from him. Following the trap, simultaneous searches were conducted at three locations linked to Parija as part of a disproportionate assets investigation.
