By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: The state government will call fresh tender for running lottery only after clearing pending cases.
An official dealing with the matter said on Wednesday that currently, the case with NV International is going on as the government had changed certain clauses in the 2005 agreement with the firm.
After the government demanded over Rs 4 crore as revenue for lottery operations, the NV international had moved the court for Rs 25 crore for certain changes in the agreement.
The official added that after the pending case is settled, the tender can be called.
Earlier in December last year, the faulty tender process resulted in the state government withdrawing the fresh tender thanks to the intervention of the High Court of Meghalaya.
Over Rs 35 crore
dues pending
The government is yet to recover over Rs 35 crore as lottery dues from MS Associates owned by Congress leader and former Assam MP Mani Kumar Subba.
MS Associates was entrusted to operate online lottery in the state but failed to carry on with the task resulting in the loss of Rs 35 crore to the state exchequer.
The government had carried out negotiations, but in vain.
In 2001, the state government had signed an agreement with MS Associates to conduct the online lottery with a guaranteed amount of Rs 3 crore to the government in the first year.
Later, there were protests by pressure groups and opposition parties compelling the government to amend the agreement in 2002.
Even after the amended agreement, the government did not get the required revenue.
In 2005, the company arbitrarily stopped conducting online lottery in the state.
The CAG in its audit of the online lottery deal had said during the four years of operation from 2002 to 2005, the distributor was to pay Rs 54.08 crore according to the terms of the agreement with the government. However, the company had paid only Rs 19 crore leaving a balance of Rs 35.08 crore.
Rs 5 crore spent on idle staff
The government is yet to rectify another anomaly as far as salary to the idle staff is concerned.
The CAG had in its report for 2015-16 had pointed out that the government had incurred an additional expenditure of Rs 5.69 crore for paying salary and allowances to the idle staff of the Director of State Lotteries.
The irony is that there were 27 employees on payroll even after the government discontinued the lottery schemes.
After the government introduced the lottery schemes between September 2001 and October 2004, the operation was stopped in August 2008. However, the 27 employees were paid salary and allowances for eight years till 2016 without any lottery scheme coupled with non-realisation of revenue.