Bills and vouchers worth Rs 84 crore go ‘missing’, CAG report indicts Chandigarh Police

Chandigarh Police personnel forged figures to draw excessive amounts from the exchequer, retired personnel drew salaries for three consecutive years and many policemen drew funds that they were ineligible for, the CAG pointed out, among other glaring irregularities.

“Definitely I will hold a meeting with the police department on these serious issues raised and all those found guilty will not be spared,” Chandigarh Adviser Dharam Pal told The Indian Express.

“Smelling certain issues”, the UT director general of police had requested CAG in 2020 to conduct an audit of all the amounts – salaries, pay and other allowances – that were being given to employees under a portal, Goyal said on Friday. An audit examination of the disbursement of pay and allowances for the 2017-2020 period revealed various irregularities.

“All employees of the police department are registered on the E-Sevaarth application, where employees are enrolled with all details of their pay and allowances. Shocking details have been found. Audit recommends that action may be taken against the erring officials and responsibilities be fixed for lapses in disbursement of pay and allowances,” Goyal said.

“Bills and vouchers amounting to Rs 83.59 crore were not produced to audit. Following that, no detail has been found. Rather, despite pointing it out… the department is silent on these irregularities. In October 2021, our department was informed that the matter has been referred to Crime Branch which is investigating the tracing of bills and vouchers. But nothing has been done in this regard.” The annual budget of the police department on salaries is around Rs 400 crore.

Other serious irregularities were also found.

“Due to deficiencies in internal and IT controls, gross negligence on the part of drawing and disbursing officer under office of DGP, Chandigarh, inadmissible payment of ₹ 1.60 crore on account of pay and allowances, LTC and other benefits during 2017-20 have been detected,” the audit department pointed out.

Meanwhile, questioned about the silence of the police top brass on the CAG report, Chandigarh DGP Praveer Ranjan told The Indian Express, “Investigation in the case is on. The special audit was conducted on the request of the Chandigarh Police only. Some of the issues mentioned in the report had taken place much before I had taken charge. We had got the case investigated by the Crime branch. For the diversion of 1.6 crore funds, we lodged cases against our personnel. Around Rs 1.10 crore was recovered from some of them also. Around 8-9 people have been arrested and a chargesheet in the case has been filed. We are not silent, neither are we trying to protect anyone.”

“Regarding the missing vouchers, we are trying to reconcile with the AG office and the treasury. We have also added sections of destruction of evidence for the missing vouchers,” he added.

What the CAG found

* Bills and vouchers amounting to ₹89.58 lakh on account of pay arrears and ₹9.97 lakh on account of leave encashment on LTC had been paid to 51 Chandigarh Police personnel but these bills and vouchers were not produced to audit.

* 42 police personnel were paid Rs 7.30 lakh for allowance but they were not eligible for this amount. The drawing and disbursement officer failed to check and ensure the admissibility of these payments. The department has recovered the entire amount.

* Out of 82 police personnel, six personnel appointed on compassionate grounds after a notification dated July 10, 2015, were entitled only to fixed monthly emoluments or DC rates but were paid full pay and allowances resulting in excess payment of salary amounting to Rs 28.57 lakh. Out of this, only Rs 4.20 lakh has been recovered.

* Drawing and disbursement officers are responsible for checking the correctness of the pay bill register and in case of failure, they are liable for making good any consequent loss. The audit revealed that in the case of 68 police personnel mentioned in the pay bill register, entries regarding earned leave/medical leave/maternity leave/absentee, etc., were not made, which resulted in non-recovery of inadmissible payment of ₹19.34 lakh.

* In violation of Punjab Civil Services Rules, 12 police personnel continued to draw house rent allowance even after allotment of government accommodation to them resulting in irregular payment of ₹9.98 lakh. The department has recovered ₹6.48 lakh.

* The department sanctioned 10 days’ leave encashment for LTC for the block year i.e., 2014-17 and 2018-21 and made entries of sanctions in the service books of 18 personnel. However, instead of 10 days’ leave encashment once for the LTC block, the amount was actually drawn twice, thrice or even four times for the same block year against the same sanction order, resulting in excess leave encashment of ₹7.47 lakh.

* Instances of excess/irregular/inadmissible payment on account of pay and allowance, retirement benefits, handicapped allowance, personal pay, computer advance, ration allowance, kit maintenance allowance, city compensatory allowance, interim relief etc., amounting to ₹3,86,200 had also been noticed in the audit, out of which ₹2,93,200 has been recovered.

* In the case of 485 personnel recruited during 2019-20, to whom salary was being paid at DC rates, NPS contributions amounting to ₹96.97 lakh at 10 per cent of the salaries drawn by these personnel were not being deducted.