BELAGAVI: The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has rapped the Karnataka Housing Board (KHB) for rampant irregularities to the tune of over Rs 160 crore in various housing projects.
In its report tabled in the Council on Wednesday, the CAG said locations for housing projects were chosen without considering demand, resulting in payment of Rs 8.52 crore as compensation during February-July 2013. There were doubts whether the compensation went to the right people.
Exposing several discrepancies in the execution and costing of housing projects, CAG said in 18 of 32 works, KHB adopted manual excavation instead of mechanical means incurring an avoidable expenditure of Rs 9.16 crore.The report said the board used water-bound macadam as base course for a majority of the roads in 19 works instead of wet mixed macadam resulting in an extra expenditure of Rs 5.26 crore. It said the allotment rate was fixed before the actual completion of the project and this caused a further loss of Rs 146.26 crore in three projects.
Pointing out discrepancies in the allotments, CAG said the board made them on request and at rates lower than the price fixed in its resolutions, incurring a loss of Rs 2.12 crore. As many as 239 houses in Suryanagar Phase III in Bengaluru and 54 houses in Kalagnoor-Kushnoor in Kalaburgi were allotted directly without issuing a public notification, it said.
Civic amenity (CA) sites were not relinquished to the local development authorities as required, and there was no transparency in their allotment, CAG said. Besides, many CA sites and properties of KHB were encroached but the board did not take any action to evict the encroachers.
KHB violated prescribed procedures while inviting tenders and managed the contracts inefficiently resulting in excess payment or undue benefit to contractors, the report said.