Indian Express: Pune: Tuesday,
April 23, 2013.
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| Government funds given to Pune Regional Transport Office for its annual road safety drives have either remained unutilised or unaccounted for |
An RTI query
filed by The Indian Express has exposed financial irregularities in the
expenditure of government funds by Pune Regional Transport Office (RTO), while
executing its road-safety drive for the year 2011-12.
While it was
learnt that quite a considerable amount of funds remained unaccounted for in
2011-12, it has also come to light that around 10 per cent of the total funds
allotted to Pune RTO by the state government for carrying out a similar drive
in the year 2012-13 remained unutilised.
Held annually
over a period of fortnight every January since 2011 until it was made a
week-long affair, the customary road safety drive includes largescale public
awareness campaign on maintaining traffic discipline.
Measures like
putting retro-reflective tapes on heavy vehicles, publicising literature on
road safety and holding awareness workshops are being carried out by RTO every
year during the drive.
Pune RTO had
received Rs 8.8 lakh and Rs 2.5 lakh for carrying out road-safety drives in
2011-12 and 2012-13 respectively. The amount was more in 2011-12 since funds
from the other RTOs in Maharashtra were diverted to Pune RTO.
As per
information given by Pune RTO in response to an RTI application, Rs 85,321 out
of the total funding of Rs 8.88 lakh meant for the year 2011-12 remained
unaccounted with a total expenditure of Rs 7,96,377 shown on paper, even as Rs
6,302 was shown as unutilised. Meanwhile, in 2012-13, out of Rs 2.5 lakh
received by Pune RTO, Rs 23,999 was not utilised. it has been revealed.
Reacting to
queries on financial irregularities in expenditure of funds, RTO officials
passed the buck on each other, saying that it was a joint responsibility to
carry out the road safety drive and their department was not responsible for
the discrepancies.
When apprised
on the issue, Pune Regional Transport Officer Arun Yeola also parried detail
queries, maintaining that bills submitted for certain expenditure during the
drive could not get approved due to some reasons, and therefore those
expenditures did reflect in the overall calculation.
Expressing
concern over financial irregularities in expenditure of government funds by
Pune RTO, road-safety activist Chandmal Parmar said the authorities concerned
are answerable and accountable for each and every penny of government funds
meant for public awareness programmes like annual road-safety drives.
“The
authorities should give justifiable reasons for financial void of Rs 85,000.
The RTO should come out in public with adequate audit report for recent
fiscals,” he said, also expressing strong objection to certain amount funds
meant for road-safety drive not getting used.
Artscope,
which is believed to be private firm, was handed over work of printing banners,
posters and flex on road-safety issues for two consecutive years till 2012-13,
was given over Rs 55,000 for the work. Rs 49,613 was spend on reflective tapes
in 2011-12, while the expenditure under the same head for 2012-13 was Rs
48,720.
Among major
expenditure, more than Rs 7 lakh was spend by Pune RTO on printing of
literature on road discipline in 2011-12, while the expenditure on the same was
Rs 1.5 lakh in the last fiscal. All this work was said to have been undertaken
by the local government press.
While Pune
RTO received different amounts to carry out the drive in 2012-13 and the
previous year, its expenditure on bouquets have surprisingly remained the same
as Rs 8,400 for both years, leaving scope in the minds of activists on whether
some kind of manipulation has taken place even while divulging information
under the RTI Act.
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