Under govt scrutiny, PCMC administration struggles to come out of troubled waters

Shiv Sena leader says govt has promised probe, makes fresh allegations; PCMC chief denies claim, charges by opposition

PCMC administration, Shiv Sena, Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Commissioner, Shravan Hardikar, Pune News, Indian Express

Hardikar, Adhalrao-Patil

Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar, whose administration has been accused by opposition parties of being involved in massive irregularities while awarding tenders for civic road projects, has denied talk about the state government initiating a probe in the matter. Speaking to The Indian Express on Tuesday, Hardikar said, “After allegations were made that tenders for road projects, worth Rs 425 crore, were accepted way above the estimated tender price, the state government had asked for a report. I have submitted the report more than a week ago”.

Along with the opposition parties, even BJP MP Amar Sable had sought a probe by the state government. In his report to the state government, Hardikar said that while sanctioning the Rs 425-crore project, his administration had “saved Rs 31 crore” for the PCMC by accepting the tender below the estimated price. Shiv Sena MP Shivajirao Adhalrao-Patil on Tuesday claimed that a team of government officials, deputed by the state chief secretary, had visited the PCMC headquarters and the commissioner’s bungalow to probe the charges.

“We have brought to the notice of the state government that there was a Rs 90-crore scandal in the road projects sanctioned by the current civic administration. The government has assured us of a probe and has apparently appointed a team of officials to probe the matter,” said Adhalrao. Denying Adhalrao’s claims, Hardikar said the government has not initiated any such probe, and no government official had visited him in the past few days. “I believe the state government had sought a report on the allegations, but not initiated a probe,” he said.

The ruling BJP in the civic body also denied claims about a government probe. “The state government’s letter to the PCMC had sought a status report… there is a difference between a probe and a status report,” said BJP general secretary Sarang Kamtekar. Besides the alleged irregularities in the Rs 425-crore road projects, the PCMC administration is also facing allegations about distributing TDR (transfer of development rights) worth Rs 5,300 crore within a span of eight months. The allegations were first made by activist Maruti Bhapkar and later by the Shiv Sena, which took the issue to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis.

The PCMC chief, however, dismissed the allegations, saying, “The actual figure is Rs 400 crore. There is no illegality in this whatsoever. It had been done legally and with full transparency”. However, Bhapkar said he and other activists had arrived at the figure of Rs 5,300 crore only after verifying the documents in PCMC offices. “TDR worth over 41 lakh feet has been given out,” claimed Bhapkar, who has also approached activist Anna Hazare about the alleged irregularities.

Meanwhile, Sena leader Adhalrao has made fresh allegations in connection with road work from Panjarpol to Alandi Road, claiming the tender for the project was being accepted at 10 per cent above the estimated price. “The project is worth Rs 51 crore… we suspect the cost of the project has been pushed up by increasing prices of the raw material required,” he said.

But PCMC Standing Committee Chairperson Seema Savale has challenged the opposition parties to prove their allegations against the civic administration. “… they will fall flat on their face,” she said. Savale said all the tenders had been accepted below the estimated price, and not a single one had been accepted above the estimated price.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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