Distressed as CAG reports were suppressed, a violation of Constitutional mandate by previous Govt: Vijender Gupta
The speaker also said that CAG's functioning has been called the basic structure of the Constitution by the Supreme Court.
Delhi Assembly Speaker Vijender Gupta decided to send the Comptroller Auditor General (CAG) report on the tainted excise policy to a Public Accounts Committee for examination at the earliest so that the guilty could be punished.
The speaker arrived at the conclusion after listening to the view of the members who expressed their concerns on the issue. He said has no doubt that the House is of the unanimous view that this matter should be referred to the PAC.
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Gupta said as per the established parliamentary procedure, the ‘reports’ should be examined in detail by the PAC of the Delhi Assembly and submit its report within a period of three months.
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According to the speaker, as a first step towards this, he has directed the Assembly Secretariat to immediately forward the report to the concerned departments. The paragraph wise comments and Action Taken Notes of the Excise Department should be submitted within one month positively.
Gupta said, “As is evident, the CAGs ‘Performance Audit Report on Regulation and Supply of Liquor in Delhi’ has brought out grave irregularities in the implementation of the excise policy in Delhi by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government. The report has brought out in detail how the public exchequer incurred huge losses so that private firms could profit illegally at the expense of the government.”
He said that the audit was conducted for the period 2017-2021, and the CAG has pointed out glaring irregularities in the period before the implementation of new excise policy like, Violation in award of licenses, Lack of transparency in IMFL pricing, inadequate quality control, weak regulatory functioning, poor execution of enforcement activities, etc.
In the new policy, the CAG has calculated that there was revenue loss of 2002 crore, that is Rs 890 crores due to failure to retender surrendered licenses, Rs 941 crore due to exemptions, Rs 144 crore due to waiver of licence fees and Rs 27 crores due to incorrect collection of security deposit.
The report has brought out in detail how the public exchequer incurred huge losses so that private firms could profit illegally at the expense of the government.
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