House panel recommends removing PWD secy over drain-desilting

A Delhi House panel on desilting of drains has recommended divesting senior IAS officer Ashwani Kumar of his responsibilities as PWD and Vigilance secretary and conduct a probe to fix responsibility for "fraudulent payments" made to contractors.
The Petitions Committee has asked Chief Secretary M M Kutty to submit an action taken report to the House within a month.
The committee is headed by AAP MLA Saurabh Bharadwaj and has nine members-- all ruling party legislators.
The recommendations come in the wake of waterlogging and resultant traffic jam across the city due to pre-monsoon showers.
"Kumar being the PWD secretary and chairman of the Coordination Committee, formed by the high court on desiliting of drains, has been in the leadership role for a considerable time. The department and committee under his sole authority have miserably failed to desilt drains," Bharadwaj said.

He said a status report, submitted by Kumar to the Petitions Committee, turned out to be a "bogus fabrication and full of untruths".

During various inspections, the committee found out that most of the drains, which were claimed to have been desilted, were "overflowing" with filth, garbage.
The committee said Kumar heads the PWD and the vigilance department-- the latter is supposed to conduct the probe into alleged irregularities.
"The committee recommends that chief secretary should not allow him to investigate himself and his own department in the interest of natural justice and fair play.
"The inquiry should be conducted by the CS personally, after divesting Kumar of the charges of both PWD and vigilance till the conclusion of inquiry," the report said.

Chief Secretary should also conduct a detailed inquiry personally to fix responsibility for "false claim" made by the PWD and "fraudulent payments" made to contractors who have "desilted" the drains only on papers, the report stated.