Audit underway to weed out officials with below-par performance: Gadkari

Tightening the noose on errant officers, Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari on Friday said that an audit is underway to weed out officials with below-par performance.

Gadkari said the performance of the officials will be evaluated on the basis of targets set for them and their delivery, besides other parameters.

“The performance audit has been dovetailed with the annual appraisal of the officials in the road ministry and the NHAI (National Highways Authority of India),” Road Secretary Sanjeev Ranjan told reporters after the government’s two-day long review of NHAI projects here.

It is learnt that the exercise is being conducted to eliminate corrupt and underperforming officials from the system.

However, Ranjan did not elaborate on the corruption part of the evaluation. In June 2019, the Union government retired 15 senior indirect tax officials from the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) to crack a whip on corruption and improper conduct. Similarly, 12 officials from the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) were relinquished on charges of corruption.

Gadkari said that monitoring and review at the official level needs greater attention and focus. 

To deal with this issue, he has directed all chief engineers in the ministry and all members of the NHAI to organise “Review Mondays” on the first and third Monday of every month.

Delay in completion of projects has a high probability of leading to claims by contractors, and hence the focus on review and monitoring by officials of the ministry will lead to cost savings in addition to timely delivery of projects. 

Besides the audit, Gadkari took stock of over 700 projects worth over Rs 3 trillion in the review meeting with the state NHAI official, concessionaires and contractors.