A contract for construction of about 1.5 km road at a cost of Rs 1.32 crore was executed by a junior engineer (JE) of lathikata block here throwing all rules to the wind. This was known during inquiry by a State vigilance team.
According to sources, for construction of about 1,540 meter village road of Garjan area, an amount of Rs 1.32 lakh was provided from corporate social responsibility fund of NSPCl, Rourkela, a joint venture company of SAIl and NTPC. The NSPCl had handed over the amount to lathikata block office as he executing agency of the road. The block officials, instead of awarding it to a single contractor through tendering, divided it in 22 parts with Rs 6 lakh each. The JE on the other hand reportedly executed the work. The construction work of the road was started during December 2016 and was completed during March 2017. Payments against all files were made by April 2017.
The locals, however, lodged a complaint of large scale irregularities in this road construction with the Chief Minister Office, which was forwarded to State vigilance office. Accordingly, a team of Vigilance under the leadership of DSP Prakash Nayak visited the spot and conducted a detail inquiry into the matter. The Vigilance officials took samples of the roads to know the quality of work.
"During investigation, we came to know that the all the 22 parts of the contract was executed departmentally through one Budheswar Sahoo, junior engineer of lathikata block," said DSP Nayak.
The entire payment was received by JE Sahoo and all expenditures as per the files were made by him. "We have collected samples from 22 locations, which would be sent to laboratory for ensuring the quality of work matching the specification or not." Nayak informed.
The reason of splitting the tender, according to sources, was mainly to award contract at own will instead of a competitive bidder. All files related to this tendering also have reportedly been seized by the Vigilance officials.
The block officials meanwhile defended the action. "We had to execute the job and submit the utilisation certificate to the NSPCl before March 2017 and therefore the work was executed departmentally." said lathikata BDO PC Bhoi.