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Journalism of Courage
One of the major stakeholders in Commonwealth Games — the Union Sports Ministry — does not have any record of the expenditure incurred on foreign visits by its officials made in connection with mega-sporting event scheduled for next year.
The ministry also lacks records of the meetings convened to discuss preparation of the International event in the capital,claims its department of International Sports. The Ministry officials have claimed that no information of either the foreign visits of its officials or the meetings convened with regards to Commonwealth Games is “held” by it. It came to light after the Ministry rejected the RTI applications filed by Abhishek Shukla seeking expenditure incurred on foreign visits of its officials abroad in relation to Commonwealth Games for which the Central Government had almost doubled the budget.
The ministry also refused to give any information about the meetings convened at the ministry for the preparations.
“Your both applications along with postal orders are returned herewith as the information asked for is not readily existing and is not held by the public authority (Sports Ministry),” Pramod Agrawal,Director International Sports Department of the Ministry said in his reply.
Commonwealth Games website lists Sports Ministry as one of the major stakeholders entrusted with the job of smooth flow of funds for the event which makes it surprising that it does not have details of expenditure incurred by its official during their visits abroad.
Sports Minister M S Gill had visited London as part of Queen’s Baton Relay in October this year. Projects for the games which have been hit by delays and escalation in the costs had got reprieve last month when Union Cabinet accepted Sports Ministry’s proposal for providing a revised budget of Rs 1620 crore as against previous budget of Rs 767 crore as loan to the Organising Committee of
Commonwealth Games scheduled for October,2010 at the prevailing government rate of interest. The Sports Ministry can moot a proposal without holding any departmental meeting in this regard.
