CAG report says tampered supply orders were used for procurement
Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), report on the internal functioning of health department of the state has raised questions over the process of Procurement based on what the report said though “Fake/ Tampered Supply Orders.”
Since the health institutions had placed supply orders on the basis of photocopies of the outside health institutions, audit carried out cross verification of a sample of 24 supply orders issued by the AIIMS, New Delhi and PGI Chandigarh, which had been used by the test checked Health institutions for procurement of different types of Machinery/ Equipment, to ascertain the genuineness of the supply orders, reads the 233 paged CAG Report.
What seems to be bizarre is that the supply orders claimed to have been issued by AIIMS were fake, and were not issued by the institution as claimed.
“The cross verification showed that six supply orders (25 per cent) claimed to have been issued by the AIIMS New Delhi, had either not been issued by AIIMS or had been tampered with resulting in procurement of machinery/ equipment to the extent of 21.17 crore on the basis of fake/ forged supply orders by the institutions,” the report said.
Apprehending that such frauds may be happening on a larger level and at different institutions the report said that “since the above exercise has been conducted by the Audit in a test check manner, possibility of such procurement on large scale and by the other health institutions cannot be ruled out.”
While highlighting the callous attitude of the officials while the orders were placed the report said that “the orders were placed on the basis of photocopy of supply orders/ rate contract placed by the outside health institutions. However, neither any cross checking/ confirmation of genuineness of the supply orders nor efforts to obtain full details of the Contract from the respective institutions had ever been made.”
“An undertaking or agreement to bind the original manufacturer/ supplier for after sale Guarantee/ warranty, uptime Guarantee, Maintenance of equipment, availability of spares, Comprehensive Maintenance Contract (CMC), etc., had not been obtained by the health institutions,” said the report, adding that thus exposing the institutions to the risk of lack of after sale service. Due to this, in most of purchases, the original manufacturer/ authorized distributor was not involved in the transaction.
KV Correspondent
