Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena has approved Prosecution Sanction under Section 17A of POC Act, 1988 (amended in 2018) for conducting investigation by Anti-Corruption Branch against five Engineers of Electrical Division, Public Works Department (PWD). The engineers are Subhash Chandra Das, Assistant Engineer (AE) , Subhash Chand, AE, Abhinav, Junior Engineer (JE), Raghuraj Solanki, JE and Rajesh Aggarwal, JE, of Health Zone, PWD as mentioned in FIR No. 08/2024 dated 06.05.2024 under sections 7/13 Prevention of Corruption Act r/w 420/406/468/471/120-B/34 Indian Penal Code against PWD officials and the private firms/contractors. This scam involving works in Delhi Government hospitals is estimated to have caused a loss of Rs.200 Cr. to the government exchequer.
The matter relates to complaints against the above Assistant Engineers and Junior Engineers of PWD wherein it is alleged that they helped in awarding tenders to different companies, favorable to them in the name of Emergent Works at various Hospitals of Delhi Government i.e. LokNayak Hospital, Maulana Azad Institute of Dental Science, GB Pant Hospital and Maulana Azad Medical College. According to officials, the alleged scam took place in government-run hospitals in Delhi during the COVID-19 pandemic wherein the the private firms got paid for incomplete work and generated forged invoices as proof of work.
During enquiry conducted so far, it is revealed that the payments were cleared by the above said officials of PWD to the firms / contractors, against forged / fake bills which caused huge loss to the Government. Forged signatures and manipulation in the Spot Quotation was done by the alleged PWD officials in order to give benefit to their favorite contractors / firms. This led to a loss of about Rs. 200 Cr. to the exchequer.
During the course of the investigation, ACB conducted a comprehensive scrutiny and analysis of various works in the Delhi government. Hospitals were awarded to different private firms and contractors during the COVID-19 pandemic. Several large-scale irregularities, malpractices and embezzlements of government funds have been found on the part of concerned PWD officials, hand-in-glove with these private firms/contractors.
At the outset, major discrepancies have been listed which include Anil Kumar Ahuja, Retd. ADG/PWD, (the then Chief Engineer/Health) gave approval to 56 Works subsequently awarded to 10 alleged firms during COVID-19 without differentiating between Emergent and Urgent Work. Desired certificates to this effect were found missing from the concerned files.
Ever since taking over, Saxena has taken a very serious view of corruption in government offices and recommended strict action against delinquent persons involved in matters of corruption.
