Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Thursday directed the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to place before it all the records pertaining to the ‘discreet’ inquiry against the contractors of the toll collection centre at Kharghar. This comes after four activists petitioned the HC that the contractors have been collecting toll illegally and was making wrongful profits.
A division bench of Justice Abhay Oka and Justice Riyaz Chagla directed the anti graft agency to submit the report by next week. The judges have also asked for the exact figures of vehicles that have paid the toll in the month of April 2018. This comes after activist Praveen Wategoankar claimed that the contractor of the toll collection centre has understated the number of vehicles, that have paid tolls.
Apart from this instance, Wategaonkar has also alleged that the contractor has recovered more than Rs. 2 crore, the amount which it was entitled to but is still continuing to collect toll. He claimed that this was an ‘illegal’act of the contractor since its ‘further’collection of toll has caused a huge loss to the public exchequer.
Last year in June, another bench of the HC had ordered a discreet inquiry against the contractors and since then the ACB has not submitted its report. Government Pleader Abhinandan Vagyani on Thursday submitted a sheet, which he termed as a report.
Irked by this, Justice Oka said, “Is this what you call a report. This report is totally vague. We want a concrete and detailed report of the inquiry.” “Not only the report on discreet inquiry but also the figure of vehicles that have paid the toll in April 2018,”the bench said while posting the matter for further hearing in next week.