Delhi Lokayukta Manmohan Sarin on Wednesday issued notice to the Delhi Government on a complaint filed by former BJP MLA Vijay Jolly alleging wasteful expenditure of public money by the Delhi Government in fighting the low-floor buses case.
The Lokayukta issued the notice and fixed the next date for hearing on June 18 after Mr. Jolly made his submissions before him. The BJP leader stated in an affidavit that the Delhi Government had spent a whopping Rs. 18.73 lakh as legal expenses in defending the low-floor bus case. He alleged that this was done without any rhyme or reason as the Lokayukta had not even issued notice to the Transport Department but had only asked them to produce the Government records.
Mr. Jolly also placed before the Lokayukta a recent report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India for the year ended March 2009. He said in the affidavit that the CAG report has revealed that in the entire procurement and operational transactions of low-floor buses on Delhi roads, the Delhi Government had suffered a loss of over Rs.1,357.33 crore. Out of this alone, unreasonable high annual maintenance charges alone accounted for Rs. 833.30 crore, he said.
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Fighting the case before the Lokayukta for the last two years, the BJP leader said Delhi Government had also ignored the advice of the technical committee of the DTC and paid Rs.8.92 lakh extra for each non-AC bus and Rs. 1.06 lakh extra for each AC bus in Delhi. The corporation had initially invited global tenders for 1,500 non-AC and 1,000 AC low-floor buses, he said.