THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Former Public Works Department minister and CPM central committee member Dr T. M.Thomas Isaac has alleged that suspended bureaucrat T.O. Sooraj had sanctioned 288 revised estimates on road development works causing huge loss to the exchequer.
An increase of 40 per cent to 50 per cent had been sanctioned for each work which was very wrong, he said. The left leader said the major reason for corruption in the department was due to ‘tender excess’.
Whenever contractors quoted rates in excess of the estimate, it would be better if the PWD immediately went for a re-tender, he said.
“Instead of going for re-tenders, Sooraj had given the nod to go for revised estimates for 288 road works in the State.
Honestly speaking, I don’t understand this practice which has since become a regular routine in the PWD.”
"By going for revised estimates and when there’s going to be a 40 to 50 per cent change, there will be an additional burden of Rs 100 cr to Rs 150 cr on the exchequer”, said Thomas Isaac.
Another left leader also said that corruption had become ‘systematic’ in the PWD ever since Sooraj joined as PWD Secretary and this would not have happened without the connivance of PWD Minister V.K. Ebrahim Kunju and Finance Department officials.
But a top PWD official said that neither the PWD Secretary nor the PWD Minister alone could take unilateral decisions on revised estimates.
The norm was that when administrative sanction was granted, it had to be examined by senior PWD officials which would then be scrutinized by the PWD Minister, Chief Technical Examiner and Finance Ministry officials.
However, he added that it was a norm which had been in practice as prescribed by the PWD manual that variations could occur during the process of the project work.
“In all the 140 Assembly constituencies, revised estimates were often sent to all the MLAs including Alappuzha MLA Thomas Isaac.
So I really don’t know why there should be such a hue and cry”, said a top PWD official. But Ebrahim Kunju said that he would look into the issue at the earliest.
