Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Nov 20: The letter addressed to the Prime Minister by the contractors association about payment of commission being demanded to release bills of different departments has been creating ripples in the political field. The association has accused the government of indulging in large scale corruption in the tender processes.

It may be recalled that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had termed the then Congress government in the state as ten percent government. This issue had kicked up lot of discussions then. Now the BJP government is in office, but the contractors association has alleged that the commission rate reaches up to 40 percent in some cases.

The association had written a letter about the problem of corruption in July this year. During the legislature session it had written to legislators with its complaint. It said that huge amounts are pending payment to the contractors and there is demand for huge kickbacks. It had also said that if commission is to be paid on such a scale, quality of work suffers, and the contractors face various problems.

The association has now submitted a letter to the governor. It says that a sum of Rs 17,000 crore is pending payment to the contractors from different departments and repeated efforts made with the department, ministers and higher officials have failed to result in payments. Workers and labourers working for the contractors are facing lot of problems particularly during the post-Covid situation. Huge bills are outstanding in PWD, water resources, rural development and Bruhat Bangallore Mahanagara Palike, said president of the association, D Kempanna, and general secretary, G M Raveendra, in the said letter.

Chief minister Basavaraj Bommai dismissed allegations made by the association as baseless. He pointed out that the tender process has been made transparent and therefore such charges have no relevance.

Former chief minister Siddaramaiah, referring to repeated claims of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, that he would not accept bribes and will not let anyone take it, said that the country is being looted and none of the scams have been investigated. He said that commission business is going on in all the departments and therefore the contractors association has written to Modi. He said that the BJP people are involved in outright robbery.