New Delhi: A report on the Commonwealth Games has been tabled in Parliament, placing Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit in the line of fire. The report, 800 pages long, is the work of the government's auditor, and gives Mrs Dikshit a failing grade largely on account of the massive over-expenditure for the Games.
Mrs Dikshit said this morning that she will respond to the allegations after the auditor's report is formally presented in Parliament, and her office gets a copy. She has called an emergency meeting of her cabinet this afternoon at 3.
India bid for the Commonwealth Games in 2003; they were held in Delhi in September last year. The man responsible for stitching together the event - Suresh Kalmadi - is in jail. Mr Kalmadi, a member of Parliament, was Chairman of the Organising Committee. Along with his associates, several of who are also now in prison, Mr Kalmadi seemed to function in a continuum of corruption, according to a series of exposes by different media companies including NDTV.
The government's auditor agrees with this, placing the blame not just on Mr Kalmadi but also on the Prime Minister's Office for placing Mr Kalmadi in charge. "In our opinion, the decision of the PMO for appointing Suresh Kalmadi as Chairman of the OC facilitated the conversion of the originally envisaged government-owned OC into a body effectively outside the government control." The Prime Minister's Office says Mr Kalmadi's chairmanship was determined by a contract signed by Atal Behari Vajpayee's government, which was in power when India bid for the Games. Mr Vajpayee's party, the BJP, denies this, saying that it clearly stipulated that a government nominee - the Sports Minister - was meant to chair the Organising Committee. With the rapid denials, Mr Kalmadi's appointment has turned into one of India's unsolved mysteries.
The government's auditor - the Comptroller and Auditor General - also blames Mrs Dikshit, widely acclaimed for her honesty and efficiency, for costing the government more than 100 crores in losses on account of poorly-handled contracts. In several cases - like in the purchase of medical equipment - companies allegedly did not deliver several of the supplies they were paid handsomely for.
The Chief Minister is also indicted for sanctioning the use of imported street lights, which allegedly led to a waste of 31 crores. Mrs Dikshit, the report states, also intervened after a company named Spaceage was disqualified by technical experts. The auditor says the Chief Minister ensured that Spaceage was hired despite objections from other departments. The company then imported lights at a cost of Rs. 5,000 and sold them to the government atRs. 25,000 each, earning mega-profits at the government's expense.
The auditor's report will be contested by the government. Mrs Dikshit has won Delhi for the Congress a record three times. In the weeks ahead of the Games, when the mismanagement of Mr Kalmadi's team was exposed via incomplete stadia and other venues, she won much praise for her crisis-management. She was asked by the PM and Sonia Gandhi to personally supervise the preparations. But the auditor's report gives a leg up to the BJP which is attacking the government in Parliament for what it describes as metabolic corruption.
Mrs Dikshit said this morning that she will respond to the allegations after the auditor's report is formally presented in Parliament, and her office gets a copy. She has called an emergency meeting of her cabinet this afternoon at 3.
India bid for the Commonwealth Games in 2003; they were held in Delhi in September last year. The man responsible for stitching together the event - Suresh Kalmadi - is in jail. Mr Kalmadi, a member of Parliament, was Chairman of the Organising Committee. Along with his associates, several of who are also now in prison, Mr Kalmadi seemed to function in a continuum of corruption, according to a series of exposes by different media companies including NDTV.
The government's auditor agrees with this, placing the blame not just on Mr Kalmadi but also on the Prime Minister's Office for placing Mr Kalmadi in charge. "In our opinion, the decision of the PMO for appointing Suresh Kalmadi as Chairman of the OC facilitated the conversion of the originally envisaged government-owned OC into a body effectively outside the government control." The Prime Minister's Office says Mr Kalmadi's chairmanship was determined by a contract signed by Atal Behari Vajpayee's government, which was in power when India bid for the Games. Mr Vajpayee's party, the BJP, denies this, saying that it clearly stipulated that a government nominee - the Sports Minister - was meant to chair the Organising Committee. With the rapid denials, Mr Kalmadi's appointment has turned into one of India's unsolved mysteries.
The government's auditor - the Comptroller and Auditor General - also blames Mrs Dikshit, widely acclaimed for her honesty and efficiency, for costing the government more than 100 crores in losses on account of poorly-handled contracts. In several cases - like in the purchase of medical equipment - companies allegedly did not deliver several of the supplies they were paid handsomely for.
The Chief Minister is also indicted for sanctioning the use of imported street lights, which allegedly led to a waste of 31 crores. Mrs Dikshit, the report states, also intervened after a company named Spaceage was disqualified by technical experts. The auditor says the Chief Minister ensured that Spaceage was hired despite objections from other departments. The company then imported lights at a cost of Rs. 5,000 and sold them to the government atRs. 25,000 each, earning mega-profits at the government's expense.
The auditor's report will be contested by the government. Mrs Dikshit has won Delhi for the Congress a record three times. In the weeks ahead of the Games, when the mismanagement of Mr Kalmadi's team was exposed via incomplete stadia and other venues, she won much praise for her crisis-management. She was asked by the PM and Sonia Gandhi to personally supervise the preparations. But the auditor's report gives a leg up to the BJP which is attacking the government in Parliament for what it describes as metabolic corruption.
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