Pressure group challenges awarding of tenders without following proper advertisements by state Housing dept
Shillong, Sept 20: The Hynniewtrep Youth Council (HYC) on Wednesday decided to file a formal complaint against the alleged irregularities in the supply of corrugated aluminium roofing sheets by the state Housing department.
Informing that the group will take it up with the Assembly’s public accounts committee (PAC), HYC president Roy Kupar Synrem said, “This, incident involving the Housing Department in unilateral award of supply orders without public advertisements/notices, constitutes a significant deviation from established governance principles and also such a lapse underscores a systematic failure in governance that raises serious concern regarding transparency, accountability, responsiveness and the potential for corruption that requires urgent attention from authorities such as the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and others.”
Synrem said an RTI revealed that the Director of Housing, Meghalaya, Shillong vide notice inviting quotation dated Shillong, the 11th February, 2022 has invited quotation for the supply of a specific type of corrugated aluminium roofing sheets.
The Departmental Tender Committee of the Housing Department held on 16th March, 2022, accepted the quoted rates of M/s Hariana Iron Works Pvt. Ltd for providing the lowest quoted rate with the supply order issued on 18th March, 2022 for the supply of 11,118 bundles of the roofing sheets for an amount of Rs 20,00,01,702 , he said.
However, without calling for any fresh tenders or quotations, the director of Housing, Meghalaya, Shillong enhanced the quantity of sheets with the issuance of several supply orders to the same supplier over the years with the last one being issued on 6th February, 2024 for Rs 19,89,94,318, the HYC president alleged.
“The process of tendering for various works is done in order to bring in transparency in the allotment of such works, increase competition, and also save public money/funds with the allotment of works to the lowest bidder. It also helps in getting ‘value for works’ after analysing various quotations,” he said.
He added that in the present case, the absence of any tendering process for the supply works of such a huge amount has raised serious doubt on the transparency and integrity of the whole process.
