The state’s Employment Guarantee Scheme Department today ordered an enquiry into fake Employment Guarantee Scheme payments in Thane district’s Jawahar and Mokhada talukas. On Thursday, The Indian Express reported systemic corruption in the jobs-for-work program, including payments for alleged work to dead people. ‘‘I will be able to comment fully on the scope of the probe tomorrow,’’ said Principal Secretary (EGS), Rameshchandra Kanade this evening. Earlier, EGS officials were called by Public Works Department Minister, Chhagan Bhujbal—the road works and forged rolls reported by the Express, are being carried out by his department. But Bhujbal insisted his department has nothing to do with it, though each roll is signed by his engineers with the stamp: ‘Paid By Me’. ‘‘My engineer doesn’t pay EGS wages,’’ argued Bhujbal. ‘‘He only has to look at the roadwork.’’ When told that most of the roads were little more than rough dirt stretches, he retorted: ‘‘You can tell all that to the EGS department.’’ However, State Information Commissioner Suresh Joshi—he began his career in the early 1970s on drought relief programs that led to the EGS—said: ‘‘The implementing agency cannot shirk responsibility, PWD engineers who are guilty must be swiftly sacked and the enquiry must see how widespread is this network.’’ Joshi added that the government’s task didn’t just end with probing only Mokhada and Jawahar in Thane district. ‘‘I am writing today to the EGS Secretary to expand the scope of enquiry to look across EGS works in all districts by conducting sample checks and arranging for public reading of muster rolls in the gram sabhas,’’ said Joshi. Examining copies of rolls, he said: ‘‘Most of these don’t even seem like human finger prints.’’
