12 hours ago
Arappor Iyakkam asks CM to terminate paddy transportation tenders
Arappor Iyakkam has urged Chief Minister M. K. Stalin and other concerned authorities to terminate the tender for transportation and movement of paddy for Tamil Nadu Civil Supplies Corporation (TNCSC).
In a representation, the organisation demanded that the tender contract, filled with illegalities to unjustly enrich the contractor, be terminated immediately so that crores of peoples' tax money is saved.
Its convenor, Jayaram Venkatesan, said that the organisation had submitted a complaint in March to the investigating agencies and concerned authorities but to no avail. The organisation alleged that corruption to the tune of Rs. 992 crore and unjust enrichment of a select set of firms.
'We are writing this representation to you all to request/ demand that the tender contract filled with illegalities to unjustly enrich the contractor be terminated immediately so that hundreds of crores of our tax money is saved. It must be noted that in the tender notice, period for the paddy transportation tender was mentioned as June 2023 to June 2025. However, when the contract was awarded in July 2024, the work order was issued until June 2026 by which they are violating the period mentioned in the tender notice. This is illegal and therefore, as per the tender notice, the tender must end in June 2025, he added.
In spite of pointing out the grave illegalities, the government has not been acting on the complaint to terminate the contract, recover the lost money, blacklist the contractors, take action on public servants responsible involved in illegal and collusive bidding leading to massive corruption. The Corporation, over the last 10 years, has been involved in scams in favour of one particular group including the Rs. 2028 crore corruption in procurement of dhal, sugar and palmolein between 2016 to 2021.
