1,000 AC low-floor buses: AAP, BJP lock horns over LG panel’s report

HT on Saturday reported that the three-member panel, prima facie, did not find criminal misconduct by any public official, even as it recommended that the 12-year annual maintenance contract (AMC) worth ₹3,412-crore awarded by the DTC be scrapped over “procedural lapses”.

A report prepared by a committee set up by Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal to investigate the Delhi Transport Corporation’s (DTC) tendering and procurement of 1,000 air-conditioned (AC) low-floor buses became a political flashpoint between the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the state unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) after the Capital’s ruling party said it would go ahead with the purchase of the buses, even as the opposition accused it of “misleading people”.

Commuters attempt to board a low-floor DTC bus at Krishi Bhawan, in New Delhi, India, on Monday, April 12, 2021. (Photo by Amal KS/ Hindustan Times)

HT on Saturday reported that the three-member panel, prima facie, did not find criminal misconduct by any public official, even as it recommended that the 12-year annual maintenance contract (AMC) worth ₹3,412-crore awarded by the DTC be scrapped over “procedural lapses”.

State transport minister Kailash Gahlot on Saturday said the Delhi government will now go ahead with the work order for the procurement of the 1,000 buses, for which two companies were appointed, but added that they will revisit the AMC in light of the panel’s recommendations.

“These new buses will give a much-needed boost to the city’s public transport as Delhi needs 11,000 buses and we currently have over 6,600. Buses were last added in the DTC in 2008 and the fleet hit an all-time low of around 4,500 buses. Gradually, when the AAP came to power, we started adding buses through the cluster scheme,” he said.

Addressing a digital press conference on Saturday, deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia said, “The investigation committee of the BJP-led central government, after going through at least 3,000 documents, has not been able to find any flaws or irregularities in the purchase of 1,000 DTC buses. The report of the inquiry committee has made it clear that the government in Delhi led by Arvind Kejriwal is honest. Delhi BJP leaders in the opposition are trying to malign the government’s image,” he said.

However, senior leaders of the BJP’s Delhi unit in a press conference on Saturday said the entire deal was meant to favour two companies as a quid pro quo and siphon off ₹3,500 crore from taxpayers’ funds.

Rohini BJP MLA Vijender Gupta, who registered a complaint with the city anti-corruption bureau (ACB) and the LG in March said the Delhi government is wilfully not focussing on the part of the report that recommends scrapping the AMC.

“The ruling AAP is misguiding [people] by saying that the committee has inquired into the procurement process of the buses and given the DTC a clean chit. This is just another cheap way to mislead the people. After finding the AMC process and contract faulty, the committee suggested scrapping the deal entirely,” he said.

The report, portions of which HT has reviewed, stated that the evaluation criteria adopted by DTC was flawed and not in consonance with the provision of relevant guidelines.

“Since the technical bids for supply of buses was opened ahead of the bid for AMC, the number of bidders for AMC was known, leaving limited room for negotiation. Both bidders had an assured number of buses to maintain, since only two bidders participated in the purchase bid. Hence, there was no real price discovery in the absence of any cost benchmarking,” it stated.

The report also said that the panel examined the material on record and observed that the allegations in the complaint essentially pertain to the AMC of buses.

“The committee therefore focused its attention only on the procurement process of AMC of the buses... The tendering process of purchase of buses warrants no interference and suffers from no major infirmity... The committee, prima facie, did not come across any material to impute criminal misconduct attributable to any public official,” the report said. The committee, however, recommended floating fresh tenders for its annual maintenance contract (AMC) over what it described as “procedural lapses” arising out of a “bona fide decision-making process”.