DTC’s liabilities doubled in 7 years, reveals CAG report

Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta on Monday tabled the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report on the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) in the Assembly, which flagged mismanagement and a series of financial losses that incurred when the AAP government was in power.

According to the CAG report, the total liability of the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC), responsible for running public buses in Delhi, has more than doubled in a seven-year period between the financial year 2015-16 and 2021-22.

The total liability, which included total equity capital, subsidy against electric buses and interest on government loans among other things, was Rs 28,263 crore in 2015-16. It shot up to Rs 65,274.31 crore in 2021-22.

During the discussion on the CAG report, CM Gupta announced that her government will present a “white paper” on the tenure of the previous AAP regime.

On the question of economic survey not being tabled by the government, the Chief Minister informed the Assembly that a comprehensive audit of all government departments was being carried out.

“The Delhi Government is carrying out a comprehensive audit of all departments. The economic survey will be presented in the Assembly. Eco survey as well as a white paper on the works of the previous government will also be tabled,” she said.

Notably, the audit report found that the corporation had not prepared any business plan or perspective plan. No MoU was signed with the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (GNCTD) for setting targets in respect of various physical and financial parameters to contain its working losses.

“During the period 2015-23, fleet of the corporation reduced from 4,344 (2015-16) to 3,937 buses (2022-23). The corporation could procure only 300 electric buses (EBs) during 2021-22 and 2022-23 despite availability of funds from the GNCTD. There was a delay in the addition of EBs in the fleet for which penalty amounting to Rs 29.86 crore for delayed delivery was not imposed on the operators,” an excerpt from the report read.

The number of low-floor “overaged buses” in the corporation during 2015-22 increased from 0.13 per cent (five buses) to 17.44 per cent (656 buses), which further increased to 44.96 per cent (1,770 buses) as of March 2023 of its total fleet.

The report also observed that CCTV system was installed and commissioned in 3,697 buses in March 2021 and payment of Rs 52.45 crore was released to the contractor, but due to the pending user acceptance test of the system, it was not declared “go live”. Thus, this system was not fully operational in buses as of May 2023.