Agency supplying manpower to LMC collects payments for non-existing workforce

LUCKNOW : A private agency engaged in providing sanitation workers to Lucknow Municipal Corporation (LMC) cheated the Corporation by supplying less manpower than the number mentioned in its contract.

LMC officials said the agency kept sending fake photos of employees present on duty and collected the payment.

“The agency kept doing this for a long time before the fraud was detected. The company in question had allegedly deployed 600 sanitation workers in around 12 wards, but when LMC officials went for physical verification only 20% of the workforce was found present. The attendance of others was found updated with photographs from the same areas,” said an official who didn’t want to be named.

The officials at LMC are tightlipped about the whole fraud, however, additional municipal commissioner Abhay Pandey said, “The matter was being probed, and no one can escape after committing fraud. If found guilty, legal action would be taken against the agency.”

Insiders in LMC said that the agency gets ₹54 lakh as monthly payment, which means it has taken crores of extra money for the workforce that never existed.

Till now, LMC has not taken any legal action or filed an FIR against the corrupt agency. LMC is also receiving such complaints from different wards of the city.

Corporator from JC Bose ward and leader of opposition in LMC house Sayyed Yawar Hussain Reshu said, “Scams after scams are taking place in LMC, but no FIR has been filed, till now. The matter is serious and needs a proper probe. On one hand, every corporator is crying about the shortage of workforce, but here LMC is paying for the workforce that never existed.”

THE COMPANY WAS CONTRACTED TO PROVIDE 600 SANITATION WORKERS BUT ON VERIFICATION BY LMC ONLY 20% WERE FOUND, SAID AN OFFICIAL