New Delhi, (Asian independent) Lieutenant Governor of Delhi, V.K. Saxena, in his capacity as Chairman of Delhi Development Authority (DDA), ordered on Thursday to register an FIR against 11 former DDA officials in a nine-year-old case of financial misappropriation and violation of Codal Formalities, CPWD Works Manual and GFR, which was reported in 2013.
The retired DDA officials include a chief engineer, superintendent engineer and executive engineer while the other officials were from the finance and accounts departments.
The officials facing action include Abhay Kumar Sinha, then Member (Engineering); Venkatesh Mohan, then Member (Finance); Om Prakash, CE (Retd); Nahar Singh, SE (Retd); JP Sharma, EE (Retd); PK Chawla, Dy CAO (Retd); Jasvir Singh, AAO (Retd); SC Mongia, AAD (Retd); SC Mittal, AE (Retd); RC Jain, AE (Retd); and Dilbagh Singh Bains, AE (Retd).
Considering the ‘grave misconduct’ and ‘loss’ to the exchequer, the LG has also ordered to “permanently withdraw the full pension benefits” of these retired officials, against the department’s recommendation of withdrawing only 25 per cent of their pension.
The case is related to the work for upgradation and beautification of Coronation Park at Kingsway Camp that was awarded to M/s Ajab Singh & Co in 2013.
The tender cost of the work was Rs 14.24 crore, but additional works amounting to Rs 114.83 crore were carried out at Narela and Dhirpur without any sanction.
According to the report, the original project cost of Rs 14.24 crore was escalated to Rs 28.36 crore and the same was further deviated with additional work, at a different location altogether, amounting to Rs 114.83 crore which was executed without any sanctioned estimate.
This resulted in overall payment of Rs 142.08 crore to the agency.
According to a source, the LG expressed serious displeasure and took a strict note of the manner in which the supervisory officers – Member (Engineering) and Member (Finance) – failed in their responsibility to effectively supervise their subordinate officials, which resulted in the charged officers blatantly violating the provisions of CPWD Works Manual and GFR and causing avoidable loss to DDA.
“From the foregoing, I am of the considered view that the entire sequence of events amounts to criminal breach of trust and the angle of corruption cannot be ruled out. Hence, it is directed to register FIR in this case against all concerned, including incumbent supervisory officers, within 15 days,” the LG said in his order.
