JAMMU; 13, May 2013:  Jammu and Kashmir government probe panel has found gross irregularities in the procurement of pipes worth crores of rupees by the Public Health Engineering department claiming that purchases have been made without proper tenders.

"The purchases have been approved by the Purchase committee (of PHE department) from the agency which has not even participated in the Notice Inviting tenders (NIT)", the high-level three-member probe panel has said in its report submitted to the state government.

It has been found in the probe that the purchase of composite pipes was approved at prevailing rates from a firm, which had not even participated in the tendering process.
That, the report points out, is in violation of vigilance commission norms.

The probe had been ordered by PHE minister Sham Lal Sharma on the floor of the Legislative Council after the issue of massive irregularities in the department came up during the just concluded budget session of the Assembly.
The inquiry panel was to look into alleged irregularities in the procurement of Polyethylene Aluminium Polyethylene pipes worth crores of rupees by the PHE (mechanical) Procurement Division, Jammu/Srinagar.
The three-member panel was headed by PHE financial advisor Chandji Bhat.

The probe found that proper guidelines were not followed in procuring the pipes from the company after the firm initially awarded the tender failed to satisfactorily meet the contract.

It was also discovered that belying the claims that the purchases were urgent, the material was made available after six months of the purchase committee's decision.

A comparison of prices showed that the traditional GI pipes used for years were cheaper as compared to the composite pipes, which cost 20 per cent more.

The panel also noted that the performance of composite pipes was not studied prior to the "major" shift of using them to replace GI pipes.