A DAY after a team from the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India met senior BMC officials in connection to a probe into the Rs 12,000 crore the civic body had spent during the Covid-19 pandemic, civic officials said on Tuesday that the audit will continue till the end of December. The officials added that the audit had started last week and on Tuesday, the CAG team held an introductory meeting with BMC officials. On Monday, the team had met senior civic officials, including BMC chief and administrator Iqbal Singh Chahal. "Monday's meeting was like an 'entry' conference. Whenever there is a CAG audit, the auditors meet with the respective department heads along with commissioners and ward officers. The auditors have given their inputs and whatever details they are looking into and we have assured them our cooperation,” said a civic official. The official added, “The auditors have told us about their schedule. the audit will continue till end of December. It will take place only on weekdays." The official maintained that the civic administration may reach out to certain officials who have been transferred or have retired. "The CAG team is carrying out an audit, so it is possible that a file or proposal that was cleared by a respective official two years ago might have been transferred to a different department today or the official may have retired. the new officer in charge would not know about the details. Therefore, to avoid ambiguity and to fast-track the process, we are reaching out to retired and transferred officials.” The visit comes three weeks after the Eknath Shinde-Devendra Fadnavis government, on October 31, ordered a CAG audit into expenditures worth Rs 12,000 crore made by BMC during the pandemic. Some of the expenses that would be audited include the money spent on procurement of medicines, medical equipment in three hospitals and for setting up Covid-19 care facilities. The BJP had alleged that the contract for running the Covid-19 care facilities were awarded in a non-transparent manner.
