SDMC: Arya alleges irregularity in payment to workers

An alleged irregularity in the payment of salaries has come to light in the South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) with the Leader of the House today seeking a Crime Branch probe into the matter.
The matter was raised today in the SDMC House by its Leader Subhash Arya, who said that the irregularity in the payment of salaries was detected in one of the beats of a specific ward in the civic agency's West Zone.
"Nine safai karmacharis (sanitation workers) are suspected to be involved in irregularities regarding payment of salary," Arya alleged.
"The salary documents furnished by the nine carry their respective names, ID numbers and attendance time stamp, etc. Our suspicion was aroused when we found nine duplicates of these documents which were identical in every respect but for the name of the worker," Arya claimed.

"What is even more strange is that all the nine duplicates have the same time stamp marked in the records that we have obtained," he added.
SDMC has hired a private Delhi-based firm to manage the biometric accounts of its safai karmacharis.

"The irregularity has cropped up due to loopholes in the system. The (Delhi-based) company gives physical documents with watermarks to ensure authenticity; but these duplicate documents do not have watermarks, indicating that they were forged before submission for payment," a civic official said.
Arya asked the SDMC commissioner to "order an inquiry by Crime Branch led by an ACP-level officer".

"We want to get to the bottom of it. Any civic officials, if found involved in the matter, will also be exposed by this," he said.