Jharkhand High Court (HC) on Friday directed the state government to file a counter-affidavit in a PIL filed by a lawyer seeking CBI inquiry into the alleged irregularities in construction of HC’s building at Dhurwa in Ranchi.
The order was passed by division bench comprising chief justice Anirudhha Bose and Justice DN Patel while hearing the petition filed by Rajiv Kumar.
The state government was represented by Advocate General Ajit Kumar. The next date for hearing the PIL is on December 14.
Kumar had filed PIL on basis of a report of a five-member committee headed by development commissioner in this regard. While inquiring into the cost escalation of project the committee has pointed out several irregularities in the work.Referring to the finding of the committee, Kumar stated that in the beginning the administrative approval of HC building was Rs 366.03 crore. He added tender was invited at an amount of Rs 267 crore adding the sum was lowered in order to favour a particular contractor. Kumar further stated that building construction department later sent a proposal to the state government for administrative approval of a revised estimate for the project. The proposal sought revised technical approval for a sum of Rs 697.32 crores. He said the Jharkhand Chief Minister then formed a committee headed by the development commissioner to review various aspects of the new proposal.
The committee mentioned several irregularities in the new proposal. For instance, the committee pointed out that the increase in various heads and the addition of more items in the revised proposal plan should be reasonable and justifiable. It opined that the fact that estimated amount in new proposal has increased by more than double shows that engineers and the consultants were careless in preparing the DPR of the project. The committee added the same consultant and engineers are now proposing an excessive increase in the estimate. Rajiv Kumar said that state government is expected to reply on the issues raised by the committee.
Meanwhile, the court today fixed December 14 as the next date of hearing in the Fake Naxalite Surrender case. The court is hearing a PIL filed by Jharkhand Council for Democratic Right that has alleged that a Union government scheme to encourage Naxalites to lay down arms was misused to engineer fake surrenders of 514 rebels in Jharkhand.