Uttarakhand launches technical auditing

The Uttarakhand government has given a green signal to the state planning commission to introduce technical auditing and capacity building for quality control and check corruption in all government schemes and expenditures.

“This may be for the first time in India that a new type of technical auditing has been introduced by a team of experts in our state,” said a top official of the state planning commission.

Under the new system, the planning commission has set up a special cell for the mandatory technical auditing of various departments. The cell will comprise nearly two dozen retired government engineers above the rank of superintendent engineers, who will keep a close tab on the various schemes and expenditures being incurred by the departments. A government order to this effect is being issued, the official said.

Earlier, the government had introduced third party monitoring during the Mahakumbh mela in Haridwar where it spent Rs 500-600 crore. The third party monitoring report of the Kumbh mela was not found satisfactory and even one of the agencies was blacklisted. “Overall, the system did not work very well. So, we are now introducing the new two-tier strategy for better monitoring,” said the official.

S M Saxena, who recently retired as the chief engineer of the state irrigation department, will head the new cell. In the first phase, the departments like Public Works Department (PWD) are being targeted by the technical auditors.

In addition to this, the government has also introduced capacity building of government officers through reorientation programmes and tours to various states.

In the first phase, the planning department is organising a visit of state engineers of PWD and Payjal Nigam to states like Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh to study the new developmental works there. “Significantly, both the BJP-ruled states have taken a lead in terms of development. We will try to understand the development philosophy there,” said the official.