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The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has registered an FIR against the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) officials, bank employees and a company for embezzlement of Rs 20 crore. The company had to collect Rs 20 crore from the customers which was never deposited in the board.
The case is registered following an inquiry on the direction of The Lieutenant Governor of Delhi VK Saxena into the alleged fraud.
The Union Bank of India (UBI) had given a contract to Freshpay IT Solutions Pvt. Ltd. to collect the amount through kiosks between the period of 2012 and 2019. But the amount of Rs 20 crore, which was collected from the consumers, was not deposited in the account of the DJB.
As per the report of vigilance department, DJB had awarded the work of ‘setting up automotive bill payment collection machines at different locations in different DJB offices’ for facilitating consumers in bill payment through various modes of payments including cash and cheques to the Corporation Bank (now Union Bank of India). They were initially contracted for three years till July, 2015. The contract was subsequently extended from time to time, initially upto October, 2016, thereafter upto October, 2017, and October, 2019 respectively with certain modifications.
“In March, 2020 when the collection through e-Kiosks was stopped by DJB, the embezzlement was detected. The matter was immediately brought to the notice of the bank for recovery of the amount collected from the e-Kiosks, which the bank had failed to deposit in the bank account of DJB during the above said period, along with penal interest and other liabilities. However, despite protracted deliberations at the senior level all this while, the bank is apparently reluctant to return the money embezzled by its vendor to cause substantial financial loss to DJB,” said in the vigilance report.
As per the RBI (Reserve Bank of India) guidelines, the bank is required to report the fraud, embezzlement of DJB funds to CBI Or State Police, as Corporation Bank is a Public Sector Bank and the amount involved in the fraud is observed to be more than Rs 3 crore. However, facts on record (indicate that the bank is reluctant to initiate any action against the private party or its officials involved in the fraud. Since DJB funds to the tune of Rs. 20 Crore and above have been embezzled by private persons in collusion with the bank and DJB officials, it is recommended to refer the case to Anti-Corruption Branch, the report said further.
The ACB has registered a case under section 7/13 POC Act and 420/409/120B of IPC and started the investigations.
