Two former MCF officials suspended over ₹183cr fraud

Gurgaon: The urban local bodies (ULB) department has suspended a former chief engineer and former executive engineer of the Municipal Corporation of Faridabad (MCF) with immediate effect. The suspension has been ordered over irregularities in payments made for several development works carried out by MCF between 2017 and 2020. The state vigilance bureau is investigating the alleged fraud of Rs 183 crore.
The suspended officials are former MCF chief engineer D R Bhaskar, who is currently posted at the ULB department, and former executive engineer Raman Sharma, who is posted as chief engineer in Hisar at present. Several inflated payments were allegedly made to a contractor when the estimated cost of the project was much low. For example, payment of Rs 2 crore was made for a development project estimated to cost Rs 27 lakh and another payment of Rs 1.97 crore for a project of around Rs 55 lakh. Officials said 112 development works done in 2017 in seven wards of Faridabad had identical quotations, which is a glaring irregularity.
The contractor was arrested by the vigilance bureau in April. “The agencies had provided the same quotations for various development works in seven different wards, which is not possible,” said a senior state government official.