Vigilance probe finds 28 bogus employees on CIDCO rolls

CIDCO has uncovered an organised racket where at least 28 people who were never appointed drew monthly salaries and enjoyed perks, but did no work. The matter came to light after a complaint was made by Chetan Bavat, who noticed that the Income Tax department had deducted tax against his 'salary' that he earned from CIDCO. A subsequent inquiry found that Sagar Tapadia, aged 50, had created a record of bogus employees by forging signatures. The CIDCO has suspended Tapadia and will register an FIR with the CBD Belapur police.

Strap: The matter came to light about two weeks ago after a certain Chetan Bavat noticed that the Income Tax department had deducted TDS against his ‘salary’ that he earned from CIDCO. Since he was not an employee of CIDCO, he made a complaint

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NAVI MUMBAI: CIDCO’s Vigilance department has unearthed an organized racket as part of which at least 28 people were ‘employed’ by the organization who had never been appointed in the first place.

These ‘employees’ drew monthly salaries, enjoyed all the attendant perks but did no work. They had been profiteering off CIDCO thus from 2017.

The matter came to light about two weeks ago after a certain Chetan Bavat noticed that the Income Tax department had deducted Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) against his ‘salary’ that he earned from CIDCO. Since he was not an employee of CIDCO, he approached the Vice Chairman and Managing Director, CIDCO, Sanjay Mukherjee, with a complaint.

Mukherjee verified that Bavat’s name was mentioned in the register of ‘contractual employees’ and that CIDCO had been paying him a monthly salary since 2017. “When I learnt about this, I forwarded the matter to Chief Vigilance Officer (CVC) Suresh Mengade and asked him to inquire,” Mukherjee said.

In the course of his inquiry, Mengade found that there were 28 such bogus employees who were mentioned in the register, but had never been appointed by CIDCO. “One Sagar Tapadia, 50, who ‘works’ with the personnel department of CIDCO, had not been reporting to duty and hence our suspicion was on him. He was traced and questioned and that’s when we found that he had created a record of bogus employees by forging signatures,” Mengade said.

Tapadia had been suspended for a year by CIDCO after he was caught by the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB). It was found that during that period, no salary was being sent to those bogus employees. “We are now going to register an FIR with the CBD Belapur police. It is crucial to figure out if there are more such ‘employees.’ So far, we’ve found that ₹2.8 crore has been embezzled. I have also ordered an audit of the last 10 years to understand if a similar thing was happening even before 2017,” said Mukherjee.

As per protocol, when a person applies for contractual employment, there is a process of selection followed by the approval by the VC and the MD. But in this case, no such procedure was followed, and Tapadia included the 28 employees directly onto CIDCO’s online rolls.

“After Bavat approached with the complaint, we found another man identified as Amit Khairaliya whose name was also included, but he was unaware that his name was being fraudulently used. The police will now investigate if the other employees mentioned were aware about their name being used and whether they received any commission and exactly how much was Tapadia’s share. After every deposit by CIDCO, we found that the money had been withdrawn,” said Mengade.