According to MC sources, the Corporation had allotted the work of installing streetlight poles along Dakshin Marg on September 21 last year. Since then, the senior MC officials, including Chief Engineer S K Bansal and Superintending Engineer Yogesh Gupta, had not visited the site even once till the CBI team raided the MC office and inspected the entire Dakshin Marg stretch to check how many new poles were installed.

The CBI team found that the contractor, who was allotted the work to install 188 poles along Dakshin Marg, had installed only 76 poles while the MC officials had paid him in advance for the work.

MC Chief Engineer S K Bansal, who is the overall incharge and is the sanctioning authority of the Engineering Wing of MC, has denied any laxity on his part saying that at his level the work involves preparing estimates, approving and allocating tenders only. Passing the buck to the junior-level officials, he said it was the responsibility of the sub-divisional engineers and junior engineers to supervise the work. “I cannot count the poles, the concerned sub-divisional engineers and junior engineers should have done this,” he maintains.

Superintending Engineer (B&R) Yogesh Gupta, who supervises the Electrical Wing, said the Chief Engineer and the Superintending Engineer (SE) cannot visit the site of each and every project being undertaken by the MC. “It is not possible for us. Besides, it is not the duty of the SE to count the poles,” he said.

During its investigation, the CBI team had found that the contractor had been paid before the completion of work. Some of the MC employees, requesting anonymity, said, the final payment is usually made only after the completion of work. Interestingly, SE Yogesh Gupta, while admitting that he had prior knowledge that payment was made to the contractor within two days of the poles reaching the project site, blamed the Executive Engineer for the laxity.

“The Chief Engineer and the SE have no role to play in making the payment to the contractor, it is the Executive Engineer who makes the payment. Moreover, the contractor had installed 160 poles out of total 188 when the CBI team had visited the site,” he added.