EOW SIT scrutinises documents at BMC HQ

The special investigation team SIT of the Economic Offences Wing has collected various documents from the headquarters of the civic body as part of its probe into the alleged Rs 12500crore scam in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation BMC ldquoAs part of the ongoing inquiry we are conducting a document inspection based on the findings in the CAG reportrdquo Joint Commissioner EOW Nishit Mishra saidThe SIT has initiated three separate preliminary enquiries PEs in accordance with the directives of Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde issued last month The dedicated team operates under the leadership of Mishra and Mumbai Commissioner of Police Vivek PhansalkarThe state government had received a complaint from BJP MLA Ameet Satam based on CAG reports highlighting irregularities in several BMC departments Taking cognisance of the report the government instructed the Mumbai commissioner of police to form a SIT to probe the matter furtherThe first of the PEs focuses on the tenders that were issued as per procedure but the agreement was not done for the completion of work The second aspect being probed by the EOW pertains to the thirdparty audit which the BMC failed to comply with The third PE centres on land acquisition which was carried out but experienced unnecessary delays leading to escalated costsldquoWe have uncovered serious criminal negligence concerning the land acquisition process and the issuance of tenders without adhering to due process A thorough investigation is underway before the registration of the FIRrdquo said a SIT member According to sources the BMC acquired a piece of land in Dahisar around 10 years ago initially costing around Rs 23 crore However due to significant delays in the acquisition process the cost skyrocketed to a staggering Rs 250300 croreldquoThe amount that has escalated in just 10 years is beyond imagination Usually prices may increase 1020 times but not to this extentrdquo said an officer familiar with the investigation The involvement of senior BMC officials and a private builder in land acquisition specifically in Dahisar is being scrutinised Investigators suspect that similar instances of price escalation may have occurred with other lands due to deliberate delays in the acquisition process The EOW has stated thatthe total scam related to land acquisition amounts to approximately Rs 4500 crore of the R12500 crore BMC scamIn October 2021 the Urban Development Department had requested the Accountant General AuditI Maharashtra for a special audit of 76 identified works whose cost amounted to Rs 1202388 crore as executed by nine departments of the BMC between November 28 2019 and October 31 2022 The Comptroller and Auditor General CAG of India assented to the special audit and moved to start on November 14 2022However an audit of the work related to COVID was excluded from the report as the BMC issued a legal notice to CAG on November 17 to not proceed with any audit of any actsworksdecisions taken with regard to COVID managementexpenditure that cost R353873 crore The notice referred to the civic bodyrsquos interpretation of provisions of the Epidemic Act 1897 and Disaster Management Act 2005 The BMC didnrsquot cooperate with CAG and hence the COVID scam which is expected to be around R4000 crore is excluded from the reportRs 4k crValue of COVID scam that hasnrsquot been probed