Daijiworld Media Network - Bhopal (SHP)
Bhopal, Feb 10: The Bhopal Swachh toilet scam may have rendered a whopping Rs 540 crore blow to the government. Reportedly over 4.5 lac Swachh loos 'vanished' in Madhya Pradesh's Bhopal.
Although the administration has GPS-tagged photographs of each of them, there also exists a possibility of never finding the toilets. But, the government is keen to recover every cent spent on them. The recent Swachh loo scam serves as a reminder of the toilet door scam unearthed in Guna district back in 2017. The 2017 scam involved the iron doors of 42,000 toilets built 10kg lighter, leading to siphoning of crores.
The ‘vanishing’ toilets were supposed to have been built — at least on paper — between 2012 and October 2018. But they don’t exist and officials believe that the photographs submitted as proof of Swachh toilet construction were clicked elsewhere, perhaps at neighbours’ homes as proof of money spent.
However, there are some villagers from Betul’s tribal Lakkadjam panchayat who ratted out regarding the discrepancy to the officials. A probe quickly found that four Swachh beneficiaries — Chaitram, Ram Kishore, Kansraj and Shambhudayal — were not even aware that toilets have been built in their name. On government records, not only do their homes have toilets but the government portal has pictures of them before loos as well. Officials found that all four were photographed in front of a neighbour’s toilet.
“A detailed probe was conducted in Lakkadjam panchayat, and the complaints were found to be true. For these toilets and other similar anomalies, recovery of Rs 7 lac was imposed on the accused. They appealed against the recovery order, but the penalty was upheld. Once recovery is done, we will initiate action under IPC. I have ordered an investigation of all the other work done in the panchayat,” chief executive officer (CEO) of Betul panchayat ML Tyagi said.
The panchayat and rural development department have since identified 4.5 lac 'toilets’ missing across the state. One of the officials asserted that the monetary value of the toilets was worth Rs 540 crores.
“In 2012, a baseline survey was conducted and 62 lac above-poverty-line households without toilets were identified in the state. On October 2, 2018, construction of all these toilets was complete. But to ensure that these toilets are present and 100% complete, we conducted a survey and physical verification using 21,000 volunteers. During this survey, around 4.5 lac toilets were found missing,” deputy director of Swachh Bharat Mission (Rural) Madhya Pradesh, Ajit Tiwari maintained.
A second physical verification is underway. “It is being conducted by district-level officers. We hope it will be completed in a couple of months. Then, we will have a clearer picture of the numbers of Swachh mission toilets. Our objective is to ensure that the toilets or assets built by the government are present,” said Tiwari.
"The data will be put in public domain so that the beneficiaries can check for any anomaly," he added.
“There were two processes of making payments. Panchayats were provided money upon completion of toilets in households, or the government transferred Rs 12,000 to beneficiaries’ accounts once they built the toilets. In both cases, it is clear where the money went. So, people responsible for the missing toilets will have to build them for real or face the music. The sole objective is to ensure 100% completion of the target identified in 2012,” Tiwari said.
Tiwari was questioned over how the fraudsters were successful in hoodwinking the technology even when the Swachh toilets had the geo-mapped feature.
“The GPS is accurate up to 6 metres. Most probably, pictures of toilets within 6 metres were uploaded in the name of the beneficiaries or pictures of toilets built before 2012 were uploaded. Things will be clear once the second survey is complete," Tiwari responded.