Huge misappropriation of funds found in audit of 6 DU colleges: Sisodia

NEW DELHI: Huge misappropriation of funds has been found in the audit of six Delhi University colleges who are not paying salaries to their staff citing lack of funds, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said on Wednesday.

"The Delhi government has provided enough funds to these colleges for paying the salaries but in their initial observation report, the auditors have found that those funds are being directed elsewhere rather than paying the salaries to the teachers," Sisodia said at an online press conference.

"Projected salaries for this academic year is Rs 300 crore and the Delhi government has provided sufficient funds to the colleges under the pattern of assistance. Teachers are not getting their salaries despite the Delhi government providing timely grants," he said.

"Few teachers came to meet me and shared their concerns about salary payment. They shared that there is a need of proper audit of the college funds and suspected that funds are diverted towards non-salary expenses," Sisodia said.

"We wanted to get at the bottom of this, as there could be a case of fund misappropriation. Therefore, the Delhi government started a special audit of these colleges," he said.

"We asked the names of the auditors from CAG and started the process of auditing these colleges from CAG empanelled auditors. In the first week of September, six colleges were audited by them. Yesterday, we received an initial observation report from the auditors and some shocking revelations have come out," he added.

Money as fixed deposits but no salary

The audit reports have pointed out that colleges have kept a huge amount of money as fixed deposits rather than paying the salaries of their staff, he said.

Pointing out that Keshav Mahavidyalaya has Rs 10.52 crores as fixed deposit, Sisodia asked if they have so much money, why are they not paying salaries to their teachers?

"The salary grant paid to the college was Rs 10.92 crores in the year 2014-15 and last year the government paid Rs 27.9 crores. Within five years, their salary grants have almost tripled. Even after receiving so much amount, they are not paying salaries to their teachers," Sisodia said.

"The closing balance of Bhagini Nivedita college shows that currently, they have around Rs 2.5 crore as fixed deposits in their accounts. It is surprising that they are claiming lack of funds and at the same time, not cooperating with the auditors also," he added.

The principals of the two colleges were not available for comment on the issue.

"These people are playing with the lives of their own staff members. They are only focused on blaming Delhi government. Under the pattern of assistance, it is clearly mentioned that provisioning of grant will be made only on net deficit basis," Sisodia said.

"In reality, these colleges are having surplus amount and yet they are not paying the due salaries of their hardworking teachers. This is criminal and wouldn’t be tolerated," he said.

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