Former sub post mistress and Horizon scandal victim Seema Misra, who was wrongly jailed while eight weeks pregnant, will be appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) today (April 16).
The Horizon scandal, one of the UK’s most significant miscarriages of justice, saw subpostmasters falsely accused of theft and fraud due to errors in the Post Office’s IT system.
Misra, who ran a post office in West Byfleet, is one of four leading campaigners to receive an OBE for their service to justice following the Post Office's Horizon IT scandal and their fight towards exoneration of wrong convictions and compensation delays.
Between 1999 and 2015, more than 900 sub-postmasters were convicted of theft, fraud and false accounting based on faulty computer data.
Misra was sentenced to 15 months in prison in 2010 after being accused of stealing £74,000.
The plight of Misra and others was thrust into the limelight by the acclaimed 2024 ITV drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office.
It showed how hundreds of sub-postmasters were wrongfully pursued and convicted for stealing in what has been called the most widespread miscarriage of justice in UK history.
Named in the New Year's Honours list, Misra has described the OBE as "empowering our fight for justice even further" and an acknowledgement of the "scale of the injustice" suffered.
At the time when the honour was announced, Misra told Asian Trader, Misra that she hoped the recognition would "give more weight to the fight" to help her fellow scandal victims.
"This is definitely a collective award - each and every single postmaster played a part, and the general public, too, for the support they have and continue to give us,” said Misra.
“The fight is not over; this award will keep the story alive.”
Meanwhile, in another development, accounting giant EY is being investigated over its audits of the Post Office in relation to the Horizon scandal from March 2015 to March 2018.
The Financial Reporting Council (FRC), the UK's accounting regulator, said it will check whether EY met its standards "with particular reference to matters related to the Horizon IT system".
The software developed by Fujitsu was at the heart of the Post Office scandal that saw hundreds of postmasters wrongly convicted.
EY said it takes its responsibilities "extremely seriously" and will be "fully cooperating" with the FRC.
