Rs 1.55 crore wasted on OBC hostel construction: CAG

Arjun Sharma

Jammu, April 9

The report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has underscored a wasteful expenditure of nearly Rs 1.55 crore by the Social Welfare Department of the erstwhile state of J&K in construction of a boys’ hostel for the other backward classes (OBC) in Doda district.

In 2011, the District Development Board had decided to construct a 96-bedded triple storey hostel at Government Degree College (GDC), Doda. The ground floor’s construction work was awarded to a contractor for Rs 1.05 crore in October 2014. “The contractor executed the work up to April 2017 and Rs 1.17 crore was paid up to March 2018. The contractor had executed some extra works and some works had been left incomplete,” the report stated.

In June 2015, the Union Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment invited 33 proposals for construction of hostels for OBCs in different parts of J&K with funding to be shared between the Centre and the state government.

A revised DPR was prepared for the construction of 100-bed double storey hostel in Doda at an estimated cost of Rs 3.25 crore. “Audit scrutiny (July 2020) of the records of Director, Social Welfare Department, Jammu, revealed that without getting approval from the Central Government for the release of assistance, the contract was again awarded in November 2017 to another contractor for the construction of double storey boys’ hostel at the cost of Rs 1.07 crore,” the audit report said.

The contractor was supposed to construct the first floor of the building along with the balance work of ground floor. However, the Central Government did not sanction the proposal, citing different deficiencies in the project report.

A payment of Rs 37 lakh was made to the second contractor as of February 2019 for the work he executed.