The Civic Authority of Bengaluru, BBMP (Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike) has handed over the investigation of the missing garbage disposal vehicles scam over to the Criminal Investigation Department(CID), Karnataka. The scam revealed the BBMP was made to spend money on vehicles which existed just on paper. Estimation suggests that BBMP had to incur a loss to the tune of a staggering Rs 400 crore.

Vehicles only on paper

According to NDTV, GPS systems were to be installed in all vehicles used to dispose of garbage, but the reluctance of the contractors to do so lead to the uncovering of the scam.

BBMP Commissioner Manjunath Prasad said, “I have discussed matters related to the scam with Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister G Parameshwara, who has agreed to hand over the investigation to the CID.”

It may be noted that BBMP uses two kinds of vehicles, one is the auto-tippers, other being compactors. These vehicles are used to collect garbage from a total of 198 wards spread across 700 square kilometres. Every day, an approximate 3,800 tonnes of garbage is collected

According to Banglore Mirror, 628 compactors were registered on paper, but 100 out of them were missing. Out of the 3584 auto tippers, only 2,537 could be accounted for. The Joint Commissioner of BBMP, Mr Sarfaraz Khan, had claimed before that these vehicles were missing, now wrote a letter to the additional commissioner, D Randeep saying that these vehicles never existed in the first place.

Khan also said that the BBMP did suspect foul play, because of which they decided to investigate the matter. Khan also added that vehicles were being shown on record for which BBMP paid bills on time, but it was revealed later that garbage was neither being collected or cleared.

A 400-crore loss

The BBMP has suffered a hefty loss due to paying more than once for the same vehicle. A sum of Rs 59,000 to each auto tipper and Rs 1.5 lakh to each compactor was paid by BBMP. Due to the contractors claiming to have more vehicles than actual, a total of Rs 400 crore has been lost in the last four years.

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