NEW DELHI, April 5: The Comptroller and Auditor General's report has come down heavily on the Tihar Jail hospital, the Delhi traffic police and the Delhi Water Supply department over several instances of financial irregularities involving crores of rupees.CENTRAL JAIL HOSPITAL, TIHAR: The amount of medicines consumed by inmates of Tihar Jail was found to be abnormally high - for every rupee spent on the inmates' diet, 78 paise was spent on medicines.Tihar recorded a high incidence of illness and expenditure on medicines per patient was also relatively high. It spent Rs 851 lakh on medicines during 1993-97, whereas expenditure on diet to all inmates in the jail was Rs 1,099 lakh for the same period.Medicines worth Rs 83.5 lakh were purchased without the sanction of a competent authority. The department stated in June 1997 that the cases were under investigation. Later, in December, it claimed that the files pertaining to 1994-95 were ``not available''.Besides, untested medicines valued at Rs 7.14lakh were received and utilised, according to the CAG report. Seven medicines valuing Rs 7.14 lakh were supplied in February 1994 by the Government Medical Stock Depot (GMSD) without a sample test due to ``urgency'' as assessed by the jail administration. Despite the GMSD authorities' instruction that the medicines be used only after further communication from them, the jail staff went ahead and administered them.Even medicines past the expiry date, worth Rs 80,000, were utilised for treatment. The department has accepted a lapse where medicines were used two months after the expiry date. Besides, medicines valued at Rs 41.3 lakh issued from the main store to jail dispensaries were not accounted for in the stock registers of the dispensaries.Delhi Traffic PoliceThe hasty procurement of lane-dividers without ensuring their quality resulted in the department being saddled with sub-standard products which cost Rs 49.86 lakh, the report has said.The Deputy Commissioner of Police (Traffic) putup a proposal for lane-dividers in July 1996. The introduction of lane-dividers was justified on the grounds that the rubber shaft was unbreakable and therefore the expenditure would only be a one-time affair.The entire tender process was completed within a week, though the same should have taken eight weeks as per financial rules. Records revealed that there was no urgency to justify the hasty deal. With only Delhi-based firms participating in the tender process, the rates were also not competitive.The following aspects were overlooked:* The life span of lane-dividers was not specified.* None of the four tenderers were registered manufacturers. The successful tenderer had experience only in computers and stationery items.* There was nothing on record to show if the quality of lane-dividers tendered by the four firms was evaluated.After the lane-dividers were installed in 1997, it was found that the rubber portion had come off on most roads leaving behind only the base plate. This,however, was attributed to ``careless driving'' by bus drivers.Meanwhile, the civic authorities began pressuring the department to remove the base plates so that road repairs could be undertaken. Thus, the entire expenditure proved infructuous.Delhi Water SupplyThe gap between income and expenditure of the undertaking persisted, resulting in accumulation of the deficit by Rs 1445.3 crore on March 1997, the report further said.Shortfall in revenue collection increased from 33 percent in 1990-91 to 57.1 percent in 1995-96 resulting in average annual shortfall in income of Rs 72.2 crore and accumulated losses of Rs 436.3 crore during 1990-96.At 70 gallons daily per capita demand (PCD), Delhi needed 813 million gallons daily (MGD) for a population of 11.62 million as on March 1997, but Delhi Water Supply could supply only 581 MGD.
