Allege detention of an Executive Engineer and an Assistant Engineer by police for nearly 10 hours at Ramban following his verbal instructions
BUNTY MAHAJAN
JAMMU, MAY 28: Another IAS officer is in soup as the umbrella body of Joint Forum of all CPWD Engineers Associations have given a call for “mass demonstration’’ on May 31 at Nirman Bhawan, Delhi, and also at all the regional and zonal headquarters across the country in protest against “illegal detention’’ of an executive engineer and an assistant engineer in Jammu and Kashmir’s Ramban district by police three days ago.
This comes amid the latest row over the transfer of Sanjeev Khirwar, the bureaucrat who allegedly cleared a Delhi stadium to walk his dog, to Ladakh due to outrage over his actions. His wife, Rinku Dugga, also a bureaucrat, was transferred to Arunachal Pradesh.
Both the engineers – Executive Engineer (Civil) R K Mattu and Assistant Engineer (Civil) Rizwan Alam – according to leaders of the CPWD Engineers Associations including Central Engineering Service Group A (Direct Recruits) Association and the Central PWD Engineers Association, they were detained following orders from Nitishwar Kumar, a UP cadre IAS officer who is Principal Secretary to UT’s Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and Chief Executive Officer of the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board, besides being Principal Secretary Power Development Department.
Seeking action against the IAS officer and Ramban SP Mohita Sharma for alleged high handedness, the CPWD Engineers Association in a memorandum to Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor, Manoj Sinha has alleged that the two engineers were detained by police for 10 hours on May 25 when Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board CEO, Nitishwar Kumar, visited Chanderkote in Ramban district where the CPWD is constructing 18 cluster type dormitories for the shrine board.
Even the CPWD superintending engineer, Mohan Lal wrote to J&K chief secretary eight hours after the two engineers were “detained” by the Ramban police giving details of the sequence of events while seeking immediate intervention for the release of two engineers. According to Lal’s letter to chief secretary and copies marked to Sinha’s OSD, DGP and CPWD chief, the CEO issued verbal direction to the SSP to “arrest/ detain AEs and EEs just on the basis of some pending petty work/ item”. He wrote, “There are laid down rules and procedures to deal with the matter of lapses/ negligence, if any, on the part of government officers.”
Pointing out that the SASB had entrusted the work for construction of dormitories using pre-engineered steel structures to CPWD in April 2021, Lal’s letter said that the work started in May and as per the MoU signed between CPWD and SASB, one-third of the sanctioned amount — Rs 10.7 crore — was required to be deposited in advance to the CPWD, but only Rs 8 crore was deposited in June. He wrote that all the subsequent payments got delayed by 2-3 months every time.
The letter mentioned the SASB has released Rs 32 crore against the revised cost of Rs 47 crore. “Despite constraint of timely release of funds by the Shrine Board, CPWD has managed to complete the work and it will be handed over before the Amarnath Yatra subject to immediate release of the balance amount as CPWD has to pay the due amount of Rs 12 crore to all the seven agencies working at site,” it said.
Both Nitishwar Kumar and Mohita Sharma were not available for comments.
Seeking the intervention of LG, vice president of the engineers’ association, YK Tomar defended his colleagues mentioning that they had followed the CPWD manual and demanded an apology from the officers concerned to soothe nerves of thousands of engineers who are tasked with the implementation of difficult projects across the country.
The J&K administration has been under the home ministry’s instruction to speedily ensure that security measures and facilities for Amarnath pilgrims are in place before the yatra begins.
In another representation, the Central Engineering Service Group A Association has written to Union housing and urban development minister, Hardeep Singh Puri to request for disciplinary actions against the shrine board chief and the SSP.
