MHA sanctions prosecution of Jain, Sisodia in Rs 1,300-cr classroom ‘scam’
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Thursday granted sanction to prosecute former Aam Aadmi Party ministers Satyendar Jain and Manish Sisodia in an alleged Rs 1,300 crore scam in the construction of classrooms in Delhi government schools.
In 2022, the Delhi Government’s vigilance directorate had recommended a probe and submitted a report to the Chief Secretary.
The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), in its February 2020 report, had highlighted “glaring irregularities” in the construction of over 2,400 classrooms in government schools by the Public Works Department.
The initial complaint was filed by a BJP leader alleging a scam of Rs 2,000 crore in the construction of school classrooms. As per the report, 63 tenders were floated and Rs 860 crore awarded but a deviation of 17 per cent to 90 per cent was observed in the awarded amount, resulting in the escalation of cost by up to Rs 326 crore.
“As many as 1,214 toilet blocks were constructed with extra expenditure of Rs 37 crore. It is also surprising that only 4,027 additional classrooms were constructed in 141 schools against assessed requirement of 5,825 in 194 schools,” an excerpt from the report, accessed by The Tribune, read.
The report pointed out that adopting costlier specifications without accessing the financial implication even at the time of post-facto approval went against the CVC guidelines on the matter.
The report mentioned the names of Sisodia and Jain as they were ministers in the Arvind Kejriwal-led government at the time and demanded a probe into their role.
