CAG finds anomalies of Rs 5775.57 cr in Assam's mine dept

Severe anomalies to the tune of at least Rs 5,775.57 crore have been found by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India in the Mines and Minerals department of Assam government during 2013-14.
Pulling up the state government, CAG said it neither put in place any separate internal audit wing in the Directorate of Geology and Mining nor arranged for any internal audit by the Director of Local Audit.
"Had there been an effective internal audit system in the Department, deficiencies detected during local audit could possibly have been detected, rectified and prevented," it said in a report placed in the Assembly today.

It said the anomaly was detected during test check of one unit of the department.
"Test check of records of a unit relating to the mines and minerals department during 2013-14 revealed that short payment/realisation of royalty, loss due to absence of standard norms for deduction etc involving Rs 5,775.57 crore in eight cases (were found)," it said.
The audit report said out that one case was found related to short/non-realisation of surface rent due to non-fixation of surface rent of petroleum mining lease area, amounting to Rs 520.97 crore.

Another case of Rs 73.41 crore was detected due to non- insertion of standard norms for deduction on account of operational utilisation in petroleum and natural gas, it said.

A case of short realisation of royalty of Rs 40.06 crore was found during the audit due to non-detection of payment of royalty at lower rates by the Oil India Ltd, CAG said.
The auditor said five cases of 'other irregularities' totalling Rs 5,141.13 crore were detected during the study of accounts in 2013-14.
Regarding anomalies in OIL, CAG said it revealed deficiency in scrutiny of the returns submitted by the licencee as existence of such a system could have enabled detection of short payment and timely action could have been initiated to recover the same.
"The case was reported to the state government in August 2013 and followed up in April 2014, but no replies had been received till November 2014," it added.