Contractor held for scam in school rooms’ construction

GURINDERPAL SINGH BATH, THE THEN CHIEF ENGINEER WITH THE PUNJAB SCHOOL EDUCATION BOARD, AND FOUR OTHERS WERE BOOKED

MOHALI: The Mohali police on Thursday arrested Rajneesh Singh, the contractor and accused in the art-and-craft rooms scam that had rocked the education department last year.

Gurinderpal Singh Bath, the then chief engineer with the Punjab School Education Board, and four other were booked for allegedly cheating and under the Prevention of Corruption Act for their alleged involvement in over ₹20-crore scam in the construction of rooms in nine districts of Mohali, Rupnagar, Fatehgarh Sahib, Patiala, Sangrur, Mansa, Barnala, Faridkot and Bathinda, between May 2013 and February 2015.

Police officials said that Rajneesh Singh, 47, of Janvadi Kalan village in Ludhiana had allegedly embezzlement over ₹4 crore.

The board had received ₹22.7 crore for the project and Bath had released ₹19.6 crore between July 11, 2013, and February 26, 2015, against 13 bills, six of which contractor Rajneesh had not signed.

The contractor received the contract on May 23, 2013, and raised the bill for ₹1 crore mobilisation advance the next day. The chief engineer verified the bill to release the money with the comment that more than 2% of the work was done.

The construction of 431 rooms was to start on May 24, 2013.

The requisite fee to the tune of ₹1.59 crore has not been submitted to date.

The contractor was neither enlisted with the public works department nor asked to deposit any earnest money, it was alleged

Station house officer, Phase-8 police station, Rajiv Kumar said: “A court has sent the contractor to four-day police remand.”

The other accused are sub-divisional officers (SDOs) Ranjit Singh (civil) and Mann Singh (electrical), junior engineers Jaspal Singh and Simranjit.

Police had registered a case against four people under Sections 420 (cheating), 465 (forgery), 466 (forgery of court record), 467 (forgery of valuable security), 468 (forgery for cheating), 471 (using as genuine a forged document), 477-A (falsification of accounts) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC and sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act.