From Cosmos Sangma
Total Sanitation Campaign scam
TURA: A government report that investigated the alleged misappropriation of funds for construction of school toilets in East Garo Hills has revealed that only 407 toilets were constructed out of the 691 units sanctioned for the project.
The inquiry report submitted to Meghalaya government on March 12 this year, by the East Garo Hills district administration under letter number DWSC/EGH/TSC-63/2011-12/34 has mentioned that the 100% physical verification report of 691 school toilets constructed by MRDS revealed glaring flaws in its implementation.
West Garo Hills deputy commissioner, Pravin Bakshi, who happened to be the district head of East Garo Hills, when the alleged scam took place, is in the eye of the storm for allegedly giving undue advantage to a Tura-based supplier and certain MRDS officials where the misappropriation is believed to have taken place.
The District Mission Coordinator of SSA, Williamnagar who initiated a fresh inquiry on the orders of the district administration allegedly found that out of the 691 school toilets 284 units were never constructed at all.
Only 407 toilet units were found to have been constructed but even from these 63 were only partially constructed, revealed the investigation.
From the 344 fully constructed toilets as many as 119 were found to be of poor quality with only 224 toilets being of good quality.
By the time the investigation was completed it revealed that there were just 240 toilets from the sanctioned 691 units that could be used by school going children.
A suggestion was also made to the government by the administration to utilize the recovered money of one crore rupees for completion of the remaining toilets that were never constructed.
The investigation found that to construct 284 school toilets that were never constructed and to complete another 63 partially built toilets, a sum of Rs. 2,42,93,500.00/- would be required by the government.
With this in mind, the administration proposed to the state government for the utilization of the Rs. 40 lakh returned by MRDS and another Rs 60 lakh given back by Tura Supplier Sohan Kumar Sah thereby totalling one crore rupees which could help tide over a sizable portion of the expenses.
Garo NGO demands probe: Meanwhile, the A’chik Youth Welfare Organization in Garo Hills has demanded that the state government set up a special investigation into the alleged sanitation scam in East Garo Hills where the previous deputy commissioner, Pravin Bakshi, allowed release of funds to the tune of several crore rupees despite implementation being absent.
“We demand that either a CBI or a Special Investigation Team (SIT) be instituted to thoroughly probe the scam, the role of MRDS and the then DC Pravin Bakshi and also those officers and magistrates involved in this misappropriation of funds. Those involved must be dealt with strongly,” said AYWO president.