Thiruvananthapuram: Top officials of Kerala Water Authority (KWA) hushed up an incident in which a contractor who had carried out works worth Rs 1.08 crore for the department was given twice the amount.
Instead of recovering the additional money given to the contractor, the officials tried to act smart by allowing the contractor to settle the amount through future works.
Not only that, four members of the official team which sanctioned the double amount, later received good service entry.
The contractor had to be paid Rs 1.08 crore for the works related to the laying of pipes in Wadakkanchery area for the Thrissur Public Health Division. However, the amount was sanctioned and deposited in the contractor's account twice, once on March 16 and the second time on March 20.
Serious lapses in examining the related documents caused the bungle. The loss of money came to light when a new set of employees replaced the previous batch following routine transfer. Meanwhile, the contractor had informed the KWA authorities about the double amount that had come to his account.
From then on there was an attempt to hush up the lapses that occurred at the official level. Interestingly, it was decided to adjust the excess money for future work to be done by the same contractor.
In the letter sent to executive engineer and the contractor, the finance manager described the actions taken to cover up the irregularity as "super intelligent."
Ironically, the good service entry was given to the four employees who sanctioned double amount for efficient utilisation of plan funds in 2020-21.