MC to recover Rs 60-lakh penalty from contractor

Sanjay Bumbroo

Tribune News Service

Panchkula, February 16

After dismissing six contractual employees and recommending chargesheet against seven employees, the Panchkula Municipal Corporation has now decided to recover Rs 60 lakh as penalty from the contractor.

According to sources, the civic body has written to the Local Bodies Department seeking permission to recover Rs 60 lakh as penalty from the contractor. The contract to refurbish 8 roundabouts in the city was allotted for Rs 2.84 crore and the MC has already made a payment of Rs 1.93 crore to the contractor.

The inquiry committee constituted by the MC Administrator-cum-Commissioner had submitted the report to the Commissioner recently. The committee, including Administrative Advisor Davinder Gupta, Assistant Engineer (Electricals) Mrinal Jailwal, Technical Consultant Jagdish Kumar and Horticulture expert Manu Singh, in its 180-page report had recommended penalty on the contractor.

The committee in its report had accepted that the construction of roundabouts was not carried out as per the detailed notice inviting tender (DNIT).

The committee had pointed out flaws in its report about difference in rates for the same river stones purchased for various roundabouts.

For Geeta Chowk roundabout of Sector 5-6-7-8, the contractor had purchased river stones of size 2 to 2.5 cms for Rs 2,400 square meter while he charged Rs 2,900 for the roundabout of Sector 4-5-10-11. For the roundabout of Sector 7-8-17-18, the contractor had charged Rs 1,990 per square meter. For Sector 11-12-12A-14 roundabout, the contractor had charged Rs 2,500 per square metre for white river stones.

Meanwhile, XEN LC Chauhan said allegations levelled against him by the inquiry committee were baseless as he had complained against the contractor to the higher authorities about the quality of work.

He said the authorities had made the payment when he was on leave for 3 days. The DNIT was prepared by a private architect and the recovery should also be made from him.

Junior Engineer Bhupesh Kumar Chhabra said he knew from the beginning that there would be large-scale bungling of funds in the project.

Bhupesh said he had not signed any document relating to the project even then his services had been terminated.

JE Kanshi Ram said he had not defrauded the MC and had been doing his work honestly and sincerely. Despite this, he was being chargesheeted, which was totally wrong.

Even the inquiry committee appointed by Urban Local Bodies Minister Kavita Jain and headed by technical adviser to the Haryana Government Vishal Seth had also submitted the 55-page report to the minister pointing out various flaws in the horticulture and electrical works.