DNA EXCLUSIVE
Department in Rs100-cr corruption scandal
MUMBAI: The corruption in the Food and Civil Supplies department runs into Rs100 crore and out of that almost Rs35 crore is sure to land in Mantralaya.
The Food and Civil Supplies Department is all set to finalise transport contract for transporting food grains from the godowns of Food Corporation of India (FCI) to the District Collector-controlled godowns in 33 districts on or before September 21.
According to department sources and from papers that DNA has in its possession, the department — influenced by its political masters — has floated a tender in this connection in such a way that only a handful of contractors can get the job. As a result, in several districts local contractors with strong political links have quoted rates as high as 500 per cent of the base rates of transportation (per tonne/per kilometre).
This will lead to the total expenditure on the transport of food grains from FCI godowns to collector-controlled godowns doubling than the existing one. It would also involve kickbacks worth Rs100 crore — and out of that Rs35 crore will reach the Mantralaya before the tenders are finalised.
On August 5, 2006, the Food and Civil Supplies department floated a tender in which several conditions violating norms and procedures were introduced to favour a few contractors. Among these conditions are:
A contractor must have 10 trucks and should have at his disposal 15 more, for which he will give an undertaking. All these trucks should be registered three months before the tender is submitted.
Objection: All the contractors to be favoured were given pre-intimation of inclusion of this condition so that they could have their trucks registered earlier.
Contractors should give solvency certificate for a minimum of Rs20 lakh and a maximum of Rs50 lakh. The time given for getting this solvency certificate is less than 30 days.
Objection: It is a common knowledge that it takes at least 30 days to get such certificate. Those to be favoured were informed in advance so that they could keep their solvency certificates ready.
Contractors are asked to give bank guarantees worth 15 per cent of the total tender cost.
Objection: This is in violation of the Central Government’s rule of asking only 3 per cent of the tender cost as bank guarantee. This condition has been introduced to favour moneyed contractors
A contractor should have at least three years’ experience of doing the same work.
Objection: This is to keep newcomers out.
A few of the aggrieved contractors are planning to take up the matter in the Supreme Court. Several attempts made to contact Food and Civil Supplies Minister Sunil Tatkare on his cellphone numbers 9423093633, 9821084442, and also at his official bungalow (number 23686232) failed to get any response as the cell phones were switched off and his staff continued saying that Tatkare was not at home.
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