Seven Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) officials, contractor held over de-siltation scam

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: The Chief Minister's Special Vigilance Cell on Friday arrested seven officials of the Guwahati Municipal Corporation along with a contractor for corruption in connection with a de-siltation drive carried out under the aegis of the civic body.

Official sources identified those arrested as Babulal Sarma (Rtd ACS), OSD of the GMC; Ashif Ahmed, Executive Engineer and Swacchata Officer of the GMC; Shankar Medhi, Executive Engineer, Division-I of the GMC; Ramakanta Saikia, Executive Engineer, Division-II of GMC; Alin Begum, Executive Engineer, Division-III of the GMC; Chittaranjan Dutta, Executive Engineer, Division-IV of the GMC; Hiranya Barman, Executive Engineer, Division-V of the GMC; and Dinesh Jaiswal, Director, M/s Dinsan Global Venture Pvt Ltd (contractor).

According to the sources, the arrests were made in connection with a case registered at the Vigilance Police Station (No 04 /2022 u/s 120(B)/420/406/409/468/471 IPC, r/w Section 13(1)(a)/13(2) of the PC Act, 1988) on the basis of the findings of a preliminary inquiry by the Chief Minister's Special Vigilance Cell.

The sources said that the previous Commissioner of the GMC had detected some irregularities and illegalities in execution of de-siltation works in the civic body and he consequently directed Pankaj Chakravarty, Joint Commissioner of the GMC, to conduct an inquiry. The inquiry report, which was forwarded to the Chief Minister's Special Vigilance Cell, mentioned that a firm named M/s Dinsan Global Venture Pvt Ltd was engaged for hiring of vehicles /machineries for carrying out the de-siltation of channels/drainage for the period from April 2, 2022 to May 26, 2022. The firm subsequently submitted bills with forged weighbridge slips for several crores of rupees and withdrew the government funds. The firm also submitted bills to the GMC showing supply of vehicles/machineries at inflated rates.

The report indicated that some officers and staff of the GMC criminally conspired with the contractor and did not implement de-siltation works as per terms and conditions laid down in the tender documents. The payments were released to the contractors without proper execution of works based on forged and fake weighbridge slips solely for the pecuniary benefit of the accused persons, who thereby misappropriated government funds meant for the developmental works of Guwahati city.

The arrested have been remanded to five days' police custody by the Court of the Special Judge, Assam.

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