Eight years have passed since the then state municipal secretary G Balachandran had written to the municipal commissioner for recovery of Rs 3 crore that was originally allocated for schemes covering weaker sections and the minorities but diverted elsewhere. The fund was diverted to a private partner of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) as a financial support for execution of the schemes, though there was no such provision. The money is yet to be returned to the government exchequer, official sources said.

A report of the Comptroller Auditor General (CAG), accessed by The Indian Express, unearths more malpractices and states that the funds for implementing schemes for weaker sections have been siphoned off for providing an “undue financial benefit to a private party.”

The schemes for weaker sections included Swarnajayanti Rojgar Yojna, maternity benefit scheme, old age pension scheme and Antodaya. But the schemes envisaged in 2001 were not implemented by the KMC. On the contrary, it went ahead to provide an interest-free loan of Rs 3 crore to its private partner for a project on Rawdon Street by diverting the state finance commission’s grant meant for filling up the KMC’s revenue gap in implementing the schemes.

The matter was brought to the notice of the government but the state municipal affairs department allegedly sat on the report of financial irregularity and lack of transparency in the allotment of a car park project on KMC land. Even as State Municipal Affairs Secretary G Balachandran in July 2001 issued a letter (Letter No. 847/MA/O/C-5/CC/2E-14/2001) to Municipal Commissioner Debashis Som asking him to rectify the financial irregularity and identify the persons responsible for the fraud, the money is yet be recovered by the civic authorities.

... contd.