Jammu Redefining
7
| March 9-March 22, 2014
4.98 crore Scholarships sanctioned without verifying registration records: CAG
T
HE Comptroller and Auditor General of India in its report has revealed that a sum of 4.98 crore was distributed as
scholarships to students without verifying their registration documents.
According to the CAG report scholarship of 4.98 crore was sanctioned during the period 2008-12 in favour of
2342 students who had pursued computer courses viz computer Hardware Maintenance level course and
other software courses in private computer institutes without being registered with National Institute of
Electronics and Information Technology( NIELIT) had been overlooked by the department before sanctioning
the scholarship, which resulted in un-authorised payment of 4.98 crore.
As per the scheme guidelines any student intending to pursue the recognised post-matric computer courses like CHM-0 level (Hardware), O,A& B level (Software) of NIELIT through private recognised/accredited
computer institutes/centres has to get himself registered with NIELIT which issues a unique registration number to such students.
Before sanctioning post-matric scholarships in favour of Scheduled Tribe students, the Directorate of Tribal
Affairs was required to scrutinize the claims of students by verifying whether the students were actually registered
with NIELIT.
Without transferring and taking
possession of land Govt released money
for shooting range at Nagrota: CAG
S
Mughal Road car rallies failed to promote
Caravan, Heritage tourism in J&K: CAG
TRANGE are the ways of
the J&K Govt when it
comes to raising sports
infrastructure in the state.
In 2008 the state government had conceived a
project 'construction of an
Indoor complex/Rifle shooting range-cum open play
field' at Nagrota in 2008-09.
To raise the infrastructure 70 kanals of land situated behind Sainik School was identified and the
matter was taken up by the Director General Youth
Services and Sports Jammu with the CV, Jammu
Development Authority.
MD, JKPCC was also approached in October
2008 for construction of the project without formal
transfer and possession of identified land.
JKPCC submitted the cost of the project at 6.49
crore to be completed within a period of 12
months.
During the scrutiny of office records CAG found
that Director Youth services and Sports had placed
a sum of Rs 50 lakh at the disposal of the JKPCC
without accord of administrative approval. The
work was started on the project by JKPCC IN
January 2009 and the same was stopped in
August 2009 on the plea that the department had
neither got the land transferred not the requiste
building permission was obtained from JDA.
During the period a private person claiming to be
owner of a portio n of land ( four kanals and 18 marlas) approached the court of Law which directed
for demarcation of land by the Revenue authorities. Though the demarcation report of the land
had been submitted by the DC, Jammu in April
2010 the issue could not be resolved till December
2012. Despite facing these road blocks, the
department further released 1.30 crore during
2010-12 in favour of the company.
According to CAG an expenditure of 1.04 crore
was incurred on various components of hte project
till November 2012 but the matter related to transfer of land was still under the active consideration
of the govt and same was not resolved till April
2013.
T
HE latest annual report of the
Comptroller and Auditor General of India
ended March 31, 2013 has revealed that
despite organising car rallies along the historic Mughal road the state tourism department has failed to promote caravan and heritage tourism.
The aim of organizing the rallies was to promote Caravan and Heritage tourism along the
Mughal road.
For Caravan tourism one of the essential
pre-requisite along with specially built vehicles is the presence of sufficient caravan
parks in the identified circuits.But despite
organising the rally for four years the Caravan
parks and other infrastructure had not been
created along the Mughal road even though
the project in this regard had been sanctioned
in 2010-11 at an estimated cost of 8 crore.
According to the CAG report, the Tourism
department organised three car rallies for promotion of Carvan and Heritage tourism along
the historic Mughal road during the years
2010-13.
The rallies were organised along the circuit
starting from Shopian via Rajouri, Jammu,
Kishtwar, Anantnag up to Srinagar on the proposal of a firm along with J&K Bank Ltd as the
sponsors.
As the rallies were organised by the firm
and sponsored by the department and J&K
Bank Ltd a tripartite agreement was required
to be executed for sharing of expenditure.
Audit examination of records showed that no
such agreement was executed for sharing of
expenditure by each with the result the
department
and
the
Bank
had
reimbursed/advanced excess amount of 8.72
lakh. 42.38 lakh and 39.30 lakh than the estimated expenditure submitted by the firm for
Ist, 2nd and 3rd rally respectively.
According to the CAG report, as per terms
and conditions of the rallies fixed by the
Federation of Motorsports club of India,
expenditure on account of boarding and lodging of the participants was to be borne by the
organisers out of the entry fees collected from
the participants. The department, however,
incurred an expenditure of 62.18 lakh on
boarding and lodging of participants during
2010-13 irregularly and a liability of 5.78 lakh
was pending resulting in undue benefit to the
organizing firm.
As per FMSCI guidelines for 2nd rally cash
prizes of 10 lakh were to be distributed but the
department distributed cash prizes of 20 lakh
resulting in excess expenditure of 10 lakh.