CURRENT ISSUE NOVEMBER 13, 2006

UGLY START

An urban renewal body in Madhya Pradesh is bogged down by corruption even before it takes off. India Today's Ambareesh Mishra reports.

It's the biggest ever plan to bring a semblance of order to in an urban sprawl. But even before the Jawaharlal Nehru Urban Renewal Mission (JNURM) could actually take off, the stench of scams has already begun to pervade the urban civic bodies of Madhya Pradesh.

The Centre-sponsored scheme is the key vehicle to transform ugly municipal areas like Itarsi – the biggest railway junction of Central India and the most important trade hub of southern Madhya Pradesh. A Rs 48-crore plan to overhaul the water and sewage drainage and water supply schemes for the town has been caught in a scam even before bids can be invited for the works.

Documents in the possession of India Today show that the award of survey work for the schemes has been so badly managed that the entire process could now be stalled in investigations by anti-corruption agencies and litigation by irate opponents.

The Public Health Engineering (PHE) Department engineers and staff still manage sewage and water drainage and water supply on deputation in urban civic bodies. The department had expressed its intent to carry out the survey work for a mere Rs 1.15 lakh.

However, the Itarsi municipal council (Nagar Palika) awarded the survey task to a private Bhopal-based firm for a whopping Rs 72 lakh.
It's bid of 1.5 per cent of the project cost of Rs 48 crore was found the lowest in the tender process in which two other firms participated.

However, a close scrutiny of the bid documents reveals it was a stage-managed process. The address on the experience certificate of the bid winner – Vaastushilpi Projects and Consultants – is the same as the other two bidders. On the other hand, the losing bidders – Shirish Garg and Soni Associates, Bhopal – both have the same office-address and telephone numbers. Likewise, Vaastushilpi's official address is the same as Shirish Garg's residential address.

Besides, one of the losing bidders failed to deposit the earnest money while the other losing firm didn't have the necessary experience.
Clearly, the two were acting as mere dummies so that the contract could go to Vaastushilpi Projects and Consultants. In case of a lone eligible bidder, the quotations should have been invited again.

"It's the most blatant violation of laid-down norms for the bidding process," says Ramesh Kumar Sahu, the ex-chairman of Itarsi Municipal Council. Instead of floating fresh tenders, the Council decided to pare down the consultant's percentage from 1.5 to 0.5 and brought down the amount to Rs. 24 lakh instead.

The Itarsi Municipal Council further compounded the matters by advertising the notice inviting tender (Nivida Soochana) in just one little circulated paper. The firm that has been awarded the contract has a controversial history. It belongs to family members of DN Agarwal, a highly controversial retired officer of PWD, whose shenanigans in Capital Project Administration of Bhopal had been caught in numerous inquiries by the Lokayukta.

While the allegations of serious nature could derail or at least delay the Rs. 48-crore project, it has political implications as well.
Sartaj Singh, the BJP MP from Hoshangabad under which Itarsi falls, is facing the heat in the case because the Municipal Council chairman Prakash Soni is his camp-follower.

Singh invited allegations of having taken personal interest for Agarwal's firm when he made undue haste in pushing through the project. In a rare incident, he attended meetings when the entire project was being finalized, documents of the proceedings show.

However, Singh counters, "How can anybody say that a scam has occurred when the funds have yet to be received for works under the scheme?" He says the Congress was raising a hue and cry because they had turned around the financial condition of the Council (Nagar Palika).
"Salaries are being paid on time. We did works of Rs. two crore after the Congress left it in debt of Rs. five crore," he adds.

There could be a larger impact of such scams. Officials of Urban Administration and Development Department (Nagariya Prashasan Evam Vikas Vibhaag) say not only would lack of Government monitoring affect the quality of works, it could also cause interminable delays in works under JNURM.

Unless the State Government lays down clear-cut guidelines and dos and don'ts for autonomous urban civic bodies, controversies like this would continue to pop up with regularity because of the huge construction contracts involved in projects like JNURM.

Sartaj Singh's track record is rife with such controversies:

Sartaj Singh Chhatwal, who heads the state BJP organizational elections committee, is an unlikely politician. The controversial former Union minister has won Lok Sabha elections from Hoshangabad since 1989 (being denied ticket once in 1999) in a tribal and OBC dominated constituency where his own Sikh community doesn't have any sizeable presence.

A former socialist leader, Sartaj became a giant when defeated the Union HRD Minister Arjun Singh. He is no stranger to controversies.
Even BJP leaders have taken up cudgels against him. In the MP Local Area Development Committee (MPLAD) scheme when he was last an MP till 1999, Sartaj formed committees, which he personally headed to carry out works.

Bank accounts were opened in different banks and works carried out through these instead of Government agencies. His signatures were made mandatory for drawal from these accounts. During the period he wasn't an MP (1999-2003), he continued to sit on the MPLAD funds from his previous stint, which were in the accounts of the committees that he headed. The withdrawal of such funds was made during the period when he was not an MP, despite repeated letters from the collector of Hoshangabad to return the funds to the Government.

That controversy continues to dog him till date. A lawyer from Itarsi, Rajesh Yadav, had moved the MP High Court seeking action against Sartaj. The court, while dismissing the petition, asked the petitioner that he could take up the matter at an appropriate forum. Now, Sartaj's detractors have filed an affidavit in the Lokayukta and written to Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee regarding the misuse of MPLAD funds.

In a more recent controversy, Sartaj was found to be among half a dozen MPs from Madhya Pradesh whose facility for unlimited first class free travel by Indian Railway was found to have been grossly misused.

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