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Financial irregularities during NRC updating process: CAG

By STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI, Dec 5 - An interim report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has detected a series of financial irregularities and improprieties during the NRC updating process.

Some of the key observations made in the report include undue mobilization advance to the vendor and consequent loss of interest amounting to nearly Rs 9.50 crore, as per copy of the excerpts of the document accessed by sections of the media today. It pertains to the period between 2013 and 2014 and the third quarter of 2017-18.

The document has surfaced days after Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma�s assertions regarding huge financial anomalies detected by CAG in the NRC process.

The excerpts of the report also highlighted non-recovery of penalty which led to undue benefit to the system integrator (Wipro) and consequent loss to the government exchequer amounting to nearly Rs 2.90 crore. Besides, the report also pointed out in what it termed as avoidable expenditure on nonviable software solution to the extent of Rs 1.27 crore.

It also claimed that lack of sound financial management resulted in excess expenditure of nearly Rs 19.44 crore.

Lack of transparency in selection of system integrator and issue of work order to the single bidder was also highlighted in the report. It further stated that the violation of the provision of the agreement on intellectual property rights resulted in irregular expenditure of Rs 69.94 lakh.

The CAG report said that IT infrastructure valuing Rs 39.07 crore was installed without ensuring technical specifications. As per the report, exorbitant expenditure on human resources (data entry) was incurred.

The CAG report divulged that from the period of 2013-14 to 2017-18 (up to December 2017) funds amounting to Rs 905.72 crore were released, of which the expenditure was Rs 806.16 crore, meaning that the cumulative savings (excess) amounted to Rs 99.56 crore, sources added.

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