Two govt officials arrested in Kerala's Panamaram for embezzling flood relief materials; similar incident reported in Chengannur

Thiruvananthapuram: Two Kerala government officials were arrested on Friday in the Wayanad district of the state for the embezzlement of relief materials, police said. [caption id=“attachment_5035001” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] A senior police official told IANS that the arrests were made based on a complaint received from another senior government official. According to the complaint, the two accused, S Thomas and MP Dinesh, were stopped by residents at a relief camp Panamaram village while they were loading the relief materials into a vehicle. Thomas and Dinesh said that they were moving the materials to another camp in the village. But the residents called the police and upon interrogation, it was found that they lied. Meanwhile, a similar incident was also reported from Chengannur where the accused was a temporary government official. Relief materials have been coming into Kerala from various places ever since the heavy monsoon rains hit the state on 29 May followed by subsequent floods leading to some 370 deaths and displacing over a million people from their homes.