Chandigarh MC chargesheets 6 officials over Rs 8 lakh stamp duty deficit

Sandeep Rana

Chandigarh, April 8

The local Municipal Corporation today issued chargesheets to its six officials under major penalty clauses and also wrote to the UT Administration to take action against former Joint Commissioner SK Jain in the matter of short recovery of stamp duty from parking contractors.

The civic body chargesheeted parking branch’s Sub-Divisional Engineer (SDE) Jagdeep Singh, Superintendents Monil Chauhan and Sunil Dutt, senior assistants Kulbhushan and Pooja Kainth and junior assistant Shakun. The officials will now file their replies to the chargesheets. In case the probe officer is not satisfied with their answers, departmental action will be taken against them.

The MC has also asked the UT Administration to initiate action against the then parking branch incharge SK Jain, a retired Haryana Civil Services officer. The action has been taken for not doing “due diligence” in the matter.

MC Commissioner Anindita Mitra said, “Two previous parking contractors — Pashchatya Entertainment Pvt Ltd and Ram Sundar Prasad Singh — had paid Rs 8 lakh less stamp duty. The action has been taken following a Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India report in the matter.”

No connection with ongoing parking probe

The MC chief said today’s action had nothing to do with the ongoing inquiry being conducted by Joint Commissioner Gurinder Singh Sodhi into the bank guarantee case. He was tasked with the probe after failure of the MC to recover about Rs 7 crore long-pending licence fee from Pashchatya Entertainment Pvt Ltd. On account of failure to pay the licence fee, the MC had then made a claim to cash three bank guarantees of Rs 1.65 crore each, but the bank claimed no such guarantees had been issued by its branch. The role of officials concerned in these two matters is being looked into.

Earlier, on a complaint filed by the corporation, the police had booked Directors of Pashchatya Entertainment Pvt Ltd. The prime accused, Anil Kumar Sharma, and six others, including Sanjay Sharma, Anil’s accountant Ajay Kumar and a bank employee, were arrested.

CBI probing the matter

Having received a complaint, the CBI this week seized documents related to the ongoing parking issue. Agency officials spent about eight hours at the MC office and interacted with different officers besides taking away the relevant documents.

Not the first incident

The CAG had earlier found that acceptance of a lease agreement from a parking contractor on a non-judicial stamp paper without ensuring its registry as a lease deed resulted in a revenue loss of Rs 29.66 lakh on account of stamp duty and registration fee. It was in June 2017 that the MC gave licence to operate 25 paid lots and Sector 17 multi-level parking to Arya Toll Infra Ltd, Mumbai.

The 2020 case

The case dates back to 2020 when the MC allotted 89 (32+57) paid parking spaces in Zones I and II for a period of three years on a licence fee basis. The two contractors, Pashchatya Entertainment Pvt Ltd and Ram Sundar Prasad Singh, were to pay certain amount of stamp duty while taking possession of the parking lots, but each of them had submitted Rs 4 lakh less.

Action follows CAG report

Parking contractors — Pashchatya Entertainment Pvt Ltd and Ram Sundar Prasad Singh — had paid less stamp duty. Action against officials followed a CAG report in the matter. — Anindita Mitra, MC Commissioner