Sugar scam
SHILLONG: A day after NPP president and Tura MP Conrad Sangma announced that he would raise alleged anomalies in the supply of sugar through the Public Distribution System in the state in Lok Sabha during its monsoon session, Food and Civil Supply minister Clement Marak has justified the decision to allot supply order to Beta Edibles Processing Private Limited.
Speaking to The Shillong Times on Wednesday, Marak said that the department took the decision after getting the clean chit from the High Court on the tendering process.
He said that one of the bidders M/s Garden Court Distilleries Pvt Ltd had approached the High Court challenging the allotment order but the Court cleared the matter after finding no merit in the objection.
“We have not done anything wrong and everything was done in a transparent manner through online bidding,” Marak, considered to be close to Chief Minister Mukul Sangma, said.
When asked about the pre-requisite norm for bidders to have a packaging unit in Meghalaya or nearby areas, the Minister said that it was done so that the department could monitor the quality, packaging and dispatch of sugar.
He said that Sikkim was following the same procedure of having packaging unit in that state or nearby areas.
It may be mentioned that the NPP while alleging irregularities in the tendering process for supply of sugar had demanded a CBI inquiry into the matter.
Recently, the Public Accounts Committee of the Meghalaya Legislative Assembly had also questioned the entire tendering process of the sugar distribution in the state.