BHUBANESWAR: Under scrutiny over the alleged Covid-19 procurement scam, officials of the State Government on Friday ignored the notice served by Lokayukta to submit reply on the purported irregularities in the purchase of PPEs, masks and other related items.
Neither the officials submitted their reply, nor any of their representatives were present for the hearing on the matter. The Lokayukta had issued notices to Additional Chief Secretary Health and Family Welfare department PK Mohapatra, Industries Secretary and the then nodal officer for procurement Hemant Sharma and Managing Director of Odisha State Medical Corporation Limited Yamini Sarangi.
A bench of the Lokayukta comprising chairperson Justice Ajit Singh and member Debabrata Swain strongly disapproved of such attitude of the officials and fixed the next date of hearing on September 14. The petition had been filed by the Congress party alleging multi-crore scam in the procurement of essential items for tackling Covid-19 in the State.
Petitioner and State spokesperson of the party Sudarsan Das said that the Lokayukta warned that it would start investigation if the Government did not submit reply by the next date of hearing. Das, who filed the petition on June 7, alleged that the Government had also earlier ignored the notice of the Lokayukta. Criticising the Government and the officials for the ‘arrogance’ of power, Das said such an attitude by persons in power creates disrespect towards judicial process among the people.
The Opposition had alleged that OSMCL procured 30 lakh face masks from a private company at a cost of Rs 16 per piece while other states purchased it at a maximum price of Rs 8. The Odisha Government had withdrawn the tender for purchase of masks and procured it from the company directly. Das also alleged Government procured 500 nebuliser kits from the same company at the hiked price. The company which had quoted the price of each nebuliser kit at Rs 3,100 on March 21 changed the quotation price to Rs 5,900 on March 23. Huge quantities of PPEs were also purchased at exorbitant prices, the petitioner added.