Vigilance inquiry has found "several irregularities" in the tendering process of UGC's Rs 225 crore e-governance project
Sukhdeo Thorat, chairman of University Grants Commission (UGC) and a favourite of former human resource development minister Arjun Singh, is in dock for allegedly favouring Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) in the bidding process for its ambitious e-governance project. The matter has now reached the Prime Minister's Office, which has sought a report from the ministry.
A vigilance inquiry has found "several irregularities" in the tendering process of UGC's Rs 225 crore e-governance project. The project, cleared on March 13, 2009, was meant to make the functioning of UGC more transparent and paperless. Though UGC has denied Chief Vigilance Commissioner's (CVC) objections on specific discrepancies, it still has not been able to justify the award of tender. Sources in UGC said out of 20 bids received for the project, Wipro and TCS were among the three bidders short listed for the e-governance project. Wipro is said to have quoted Rs 90 crore less than TCS.
TCS was awarded the project despite strong and serious objections from UGC secretary Raju Sharma, MHRD secretary R P Aggarwal and financial advisor S K Ray. Sharma, interestingly, was later removed from his post for jotting his objections on the tender files. The CVC has also pointed to procedural errors committed in the process of selection of the consultant. For instance, the last date of submission of bids was extended by three days even though 19 tenders had already been received by then, clearly indicating that UGC wanted to favour a particular company. Besides, two parameters, which had not been mentioned in the notice inviting tender were added later while short-listing the consultancy firms
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