NGOs allege corruption in water project

A consortium of NGOs on Tuesday alleged corruption in Delhi Jal Board's (DJB) 24X7 public private partnership (PPP) water project in Nangloi and claimed the private companies allotted the work do not meet technical and financial criteria.

A consortium of NGOs on Tuesday alleged corruption in Delhi Jal Board's (DJB) 24X7 public private partnership (PPP) water project in Nangloi and claimed the private companies allotted the work do not meet technical and financial criteria.

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Citizen's Front for Water Democracy, the consortium of NGOs, water activists and trade unions, alleged: "The Indian company of the consortium was constituted in August 2011 and is an environmental business entity affiliated to an infrastructure finance company."

"The foreign arm is an Indian subsidiary of a French company, which too doesn't qualify for number of connections provided, on the basis of its previous works in three Indian cities put together," SA Naqvi, front convener said.

The water utility revamped the water treatment and distribution in the command area for Nangloi in west Delhi under the PPP model. This is the third such project after Mehrauli-Vasant Kunj and Malviya Nagar scheme in south Delhi.

"The Letter of Intent was given to the consortium on October 26 itself even though the board meeting that cleared this proposal ended only at about 6.30pm on that day," he said, adding, "Minutes were not approved. Also steps such as the DJB secretary's letter and the Nangloi water project division's letter were omitted."

The front claimed the DJB was providing misleading information on the number of connections and the length of the pipeline that needs to be replaced in Nangloi .

Rubbishing the claims, Debashree Mukherjee, DJB CEO said, "This (tender process) has gone through a detailed process and we have verified technical and financial credibility of the company. Due diligence was carried out and there was a global tendering process. If it was done in a fraudulent manner, there would have been complaints/court cases from the other international bidders."