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| Pulwama admin withholds installation of street lights after scam comes to light | | | Jehangir Rashid
Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, Jan 15: Following stiff resistance by DDC members who rejected installing the lights in their constituency and Halqas, the district administration Pulwama had put on hold the process of installation of the lights.
This happened after a street light scam surfaced in the South Kashmir district of Pulwama. It has been learnt from sources that officials in the Rural Development department (RDD) Pulwama have purchased streetlights at exorbitant rates to benefit a blue-eyed contractor.
“The RDD officials have purchased the streetlights at nearly 100 percent increase in price without following proper procedure for tendering,” said an official. Officials said the highest price of a street light installed by the RDD cost Rs. 14,000, while the Pulwama officials bought them at more than Rs. 24,000.
The streetlights are yet to be installed and administration has made an advance payment to the contractor. The blue-eyed contractors in league with officials have purchased solar lights on higher rates incurring losses to Panchayat Raj institution funds. The tenders are floated by the RDD with the approval of the Assistant Commissioner Development (ACD) through the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) portal.
The DDC members in Pulwama district too approved the plan to install solar street lights in their constituencies and the plan was vetted by the ACD. The ACD office opened the link for e-tenders on GeM portal for a particular period of time so that his blue-eyed contractors get the tenders.
They said that only companies namely Friends Sales, Mectech, JK Electronics, Hi-Technology filed the tenders while others could not file as the link was not put up for public by the ACD office. “The link for the e-tender was put on the GeM portal during a prescribed time so that only the above favorite companies can apply. We didn't see the link,” several companies and the contractors said.
As per the DDC members, they had approved the plan of nearly rupees one crore for installation of the lights and were expecting that the villages falling in their halqas will get adequate street lights. But they were shocked to see that each light purchased between Rs 23,000 to Rs 24000 when the similar lights cost Rs 12,000 to Rs 13,000 in the market. The same lights were installed by JAKEDA in Jammu and Kashmir for Rs 12,000 each.
Sources said the ACD office has released half of the payment to the contractors before the execution of the work. The companies have shown exorbitant cost for the lights and officials in ACD are in league with them, they added. |
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