Between April 2017 and June 2022, sixteen Union government ministries paid Rs 500 crore to five consultancy firms for several projects, Indian Express reported.
Under information made available under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, reports show that the 'Big Five' - PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, Ernst & Young Global Limited, and KPMG International Limited, along with McKinsey & Company, secured at least 308 consultancy assignments worth nearly Rs 500 crore from various government ministries, departments and organisations.
These projects involved a sweeping range of activities for the government, including "financial due diligence", "retainer for advisory service", "hiring technical consultants", and even "evaluation of nominations of e-governance awards".
The 16 ministries are Rural Development; Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances; Coal; Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade; Electronics and Information Technology; Health and Family Welfare; Skill Development and Entrepreneurship; Defence; Civil Aviation; Public Enterprises; Non-conventional Energy Resources; Power; Road Transport and Highways; Environment, Forest and Climate Change; and Tourism.
Of these Ministries, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas and four of its Public sector undertakings (PSU) outsourced contracts worth over Rs 170 crore.
Second on the list is the power sector, with nine organisations under the power ministry, which gave assignments worth Rs 166.41 crore to the 'Big Five' consultancies.
It may be noted that the Indian Oil Corporation declined to provide the data on contracts it awarded to firms citing the " trade secrets" clause of the RTI Act.
Among the 'Big Five' firms, PwC bagged the highest number of contracts, securing at least 92 contracts for over Rs 156 crore. Deloitte got 59 assignments worth over Rs 130.13 crore. E&Y secured 87 contracts for Rs 88.05 crore, while KPMG got 66 contracts worth Rs 68.46 crore.McKinsey bagged three contracts for Rs 50.09 crore.