File criminal cases against errant MCD officers: HC

The issue of ghost employees has come to haunt the MCD once again with the Delhi high court on Wednesday ordering the Delhi police commissioner to register criminal cases against errant MCD officials.

The issue of ghost employees has come to haunt the MCD once again with the Delhi high court on Wednesday ordering the Delhi police commissioner to register criminal cases against errant MCD officials.

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These officials had allegedly been withdrawing salaries on behalf of hundreds of ghost employees.

A bench headed by chief justice Dipak Misra rejected the contention of MCD commissioner KS Mehra that no ghost employee existed in the civic body and that the issue was a result of “hype created by the media”.

Mehra had defended MCD, saying whatever irregularities have been alleged were the result of ‘starting troubles’ in the implementation of the biometric system.

The order came following government standing counsel Nazmi Waziri’s submission that so far, none of the 1,588 ghost employees, in whose names salaries had been withdrawn, had been traced in the police probe. Waziri submitted that the police need to register an FIR in this regard against the errant MCD officials.

The court also directed MCD to initiate a departmental inquiry against officials responsible for the release of salaries in the name of ghost employees.

It also told Delhi government’s chief secretary to convene a meeting of senior MCD officials as well as the police to adopt a system to avoid the recurrence of another such farce in future.

The Delhi government had earlier told the court that the MCD had caused a loss of about Rs 500 crore to the public exchequer in the past five years by paying salaries to hundreds of its ghost employees.