Ranchi, April 5: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has seized Rs 16.50 lakh from the premises of Ashish Ranjan, the district coordinator of Ayushman Bharat Yojana.
He is posted in Ayushman Bharat Yojana in Ranchi Sadar Hospital. At present, a departmental level investigation is going on in the matter of his educational qualification and appointment to the post of coordinator.
In the Ayushman scam case, the raid started at 21 locations on Friday morning, which ended late at night. After investigating the cash amount found during the raid, ED seized a total of Rs 18.50 lakh. Out of this, Rs 2 lakh was seized from Om Prakash’s house.
ED has also seized many documents related to flat and land from Om Prakash’s house. At present, its investigation is going on. The ED has also seized documents related to the scam including digital devices, laptops found at the premises of people associated with companies engaged in third party assessment.
Out of the Rs 18.50 lakh seized by the ED, Rs 16.50 lakh was recovered from the premises of the district coordinator of the Ayushman scheme. The salary of the district coordinator is only Rs 50,000. The recovery of this amount is considered to be a minor part of the illegal recovery in the Ayushman Bharat scheme.
Ashish Ranjan was appointed in 2019 during the tenure of former civil surgeon of Ranchi Sadar Hospital, Dr. Vijay Bihari Prasad. For appointment to the post of District Coordinator in the Ayushman Bharat scheme, the applicant was required to have an MBA degree.
In the complaint received by the government, it was alleged that Ashish Ranjan’s MBA degree is fake. He had presented a certificate related to obtaining an MBA degree from the Institute of Business, Darbhanga.
Ashish Ranjan is accused of playing an important role in carrying out the Ayushman scam. Apart from this, he is also accused of taking incentives in Ayushman Yojana in a wrong way.
