New Delhi [India], September 24 (ANI): The Delhi Lieutenant Governor on Saturday directed the Chief Secretary to lodge an FIR in opposition to Delhi Jal Board officers and others for embezzlement of Rs 20 crore, stated an announcement.
The LG has additionally instructed that Officers/Officials of the Delhi Jal Board concerned within the above siphoning of funds could also be recognized, their accountability mounted and a report on the motion taken thereof to be submitted inside 15 days, as per the assertion.
In a blatant case of corruption amounting to very large monetary losses to DJB, money amounting to over Rs 20 crore collected as water payments from people, went to a personal checking account somewhat than DJB’s checking account for a number of years, as per the assertion.
The DJB appointed its banker, Corporation Bank to gather water payments on its behalf by order in June 2012 for 3 years and the identical was renewed additional in 2016, 2017 and even in 2019, after the fraud was detected.
The financial institution, in flip, in complete violation of the phrases of the contract and within the data of DJB officers, engaged a personal company M/s Freshpay IT Solutions Pvt. Ltd. for assortment of money and cheques and for deposition of the identical in DJB’s checking account.
It was seen whereas extending the contract of the financial institution past October 10, 2019, when Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal was the Chairman of DJB, that grave irregularities had occurred relating to delayed/non-deposition of money by the financial institution through the interval of contract from August 11, 2012, to October 10, 2019.
It was noticed that quite a lot of Rs. 20 crore (together with curiosity, penalty, and many others.), although deposited by the customers had not been transferred into the DJB’s Bank Account. Despite figuring out all this, the Board headed by Kejriwal additional prolonged the contract of Corporation Bank and in flip that of M/s Freshpay IT Solutions Pvt. Ltd., which was working because the financial institution’s assortment agent, until 2020.
What is much more damaging is that, somewhat than making the erring distributors pay the swindled Rs 20 crore and punishing them, the DJB not solely prolonged their contract however elevated their service payment from Rs 5 to Rs 6 per invoice. Also in baffling contrivance, DJB criminally relaxed the T1 (Transaction 1) norm that made it necessary for the seller to deposit the money collected from the individuals within the account of DJB checking account inside 24 hrs of the gathering this additional helped the distributors swindle money.
Subsequently, it was discovered that payments collected from the individuals of Delhi in money have been deposited within the Federal Bank and from there it was transferred to the personal account of 1 M/s Aurrum E-Payments Pvt. Ltd., somewhat than getting deposited into the DJB’s Bank Account.
The above association, i.e. deposition of DJB’s money in some personal checking account of a 3rd social gathering was in clear violation of the contract settlement between DJB and Corporation Bank. With ulterior motives of siphoning money, the Corporation Bank had tacitly accepted the above association and the DJB officers in connivance didn’t object to it, even if this transfer had put DJB funds in danger.
LG has taken a severe notice of the truth that regardless of the fraud coming to gentle, the DJB not solely didn’t make any effort to get well the money and punish the responsible however convolutedly prolonged the contract of the embezzlers by one other 12 months, thereby establishing prima facie connivance.
The default on the a part of the Bank within the deposition of money collected from the Kiosks was within the discover of DJB and Bank officers proper from the start; nevertheless, no try, in anyway, was ever made to arrest the malpractice or fraud being dedicated by the Private Party with the tacit approval of the Bank and DJB officers.
That regardless of such severe deficiencies, the contract was additional prolonged with the relaxed circumstances, indicating malafide on a part of stated officers with a view to inflicting severe monetary loss to DJB. One can be left to surprise as to why wasn’t the DJB doing routine weekly reconciliation of its accounts, as is the norm. (ANI)