BLACK STROKE

BLACK STROKE
A manager of the prestigious Basavanagudi Aquatic Centre, which has nurtured two Olympic swimmers and a couple of Arjuna Award winners, has swindled Rs 10 lakh from official funds, according to the FIR filed in Shankarapuram police station
PRAVEEN KUMAR


An assistant manager of Basavanagudi Aquatic Centre (BAC), the city’s premier swimming pool complex, has allegedly misappropriated more than Rs 10 lakh from official funds. A cheating case has been registered against him with the Shankarapuram police, and City Crime Branch (CCB) sleuths are investigating the case.
The BAC, a non-profit voluntary association found to promote aquatic sports in 1986, took the BBMP’s swimming pool on the Pampa Mahakavi Road on a long-term lease in 1991. The BAC is managed by an elected managing committee comprising the president, vice president, secretary, treasurer, joint secretary and six other committee members.
G R Rajanna, the BAC’s honorary secretary, has alleged that R Sathyanarayana, the assistant manager, misappropriated funds by tampering BAC records.
LEGAL ACTION
Sathyanarayana, who was working as office assistant in BAC for the last 16 years, was promoted as assistant manager in September 2007. He was entrusted with collection of fees, issuing of receipts, identity cards and remitting accounts to the bank, a BAC office bearer told
Bangalore Mirror.
The procedure of the BAC is such that Sathyanarayana had to give details of the accounts at regular intervals to a member of the executive committee, Nagaraj. The executive committee convened a meeting last month to scrutinise the summer camp accounts.
IN THE FAST LANE
The BAC boasts of international level facilities. It has three pools - a 50-metre pool, a 25-metre pool and one for kids. The 50-metre and 25-metre pools have eight lanes each, which is on par with Olympic standards. In fact, two swimmers, Nisha Millet and Rehan Poncha, who trained at BAC have competed in 2000 and 2008 Olympics respectively. Other notable swimmers who have been nurtured at BAC are Sajini Shetty, Ashima Shetty, Ambika Iyengar, Reshma Millet and Aaron D’souza. Nisha Millet and Abhijeet have also been honoured with the Arjuna award by the Government of India.
The last big event held in the pool was in 2006 - the senior national swimming championships. The aquatic events of the 1997 National Games was also held here.
In that meeting, Nagaraj told the executive committee that Sathyanarayana had not submitted the summer camp accounts. Sathyanarayana himself was absent for the meeting, though he had informed Nagaraj about attending it and submitting the accounts. The executive committee, which learnt that Sathyanarayana was hospitalised, told his family members that the latter should report back to work at the earliest. They were also told that the committee would be compelled to take legal action against him if he failed to submit the accounts.
AUDIT REPORT
Padmanabhan, the father-in-law of Sathyanarayana, initially requested the executive committee not to initiate any legal action against the latter. He also entrusted them with original documents of immovable property of Sathyanarayana’s daughter as a security against the alleged misappropriation of funds, the BAC office bearer revealed. But when Padmanabhan later learnt that his son-in-law had indeed misappropriated a very large amount, he asked the committee to return the property documents and to go ahead with legal action.
An auditor, who was appointed to investigate the fraud, submitted an interim report which confirmed that Sathyanarayana had misappropriated funds. Following the report, the executive committee has directed Rajanna to take all necessary legal steps against Sathyanarayana.