Adil Lateef
Srinagar, July 3: The Floriculture Department’s failure to identify an agency for establishment of cold store at Tulip Garden Srinagar resulted in blockade of Rs 3.95 crore and avoidable expenditure of Rs. 1.63 crore on purchase of tulip bulbs, Comp-troller and Audit General (CAG) report has found.
The CAG report, which was tabled in both Houses of State legislature last week, said for propagation and storage of tulip and other bulbs in scientific manner, the Director Floriculture Kashmir proposed (September 2009) establishment of cold store at Tulip Garden Srinagar at a cost of Rs 4 crore to the State Government and the project was targeted to be completed by March 2010.
Audit scrutiny (June 2014) of records of Director Floriculture Kashmir showed that the tendering process for the cold store was initiated in October 2009 and then again in April 2010 in consultation with Mechanical Engineering Department Kashmir ‘but due to lack of specific technology for establishment of such store in India there was poor response of the bidders’.
The CAG said that the Department thereafter appro-ached (August 2011) State Trading Corporation (STC) of India, New Delhi for establishment of cold store. “The STC furnished copy of agreement of terms and conditions with the end-user Department for import/ supply for acceptance which was submitted to the Government by the Director and the matter was referred to the Committee already constituted (April 2011) for the purpose,” said the CAG.
The Committee opined to entrust the job of establishment of cold store to Chief Engineer Mechanical Enginee-ring Department Kashmir. However, the CAG report said, no headway was made in establishment of cold store (March 2015).
Audit further noticed that administrative approval of the project was accorded (February 2010) and Rs 3.95 crore was advanced (March 2010) by the Government to Director Floriculture Kashmir for establishment of the cold store unit. “The Director withdrew and deposited Rs 3.95 crore in his Current Bank account and the amount was subsequently transferred (March 2013) to the Deposit Head of account. The structural storage facilities for preserving tulip bulbs could not be put in place,” the CAG said.
As a result, read the CAG report, the Department had to incur an expenditure of Rs 1.63 crore during the period from 2010-11 to 2013-14 on purchase/ import of tulip bulbs. The report said the lack of planning by the Director Floriculture Kashmir in establishment of cold store by withdrawing funds in advance resulted in blockade of Rs 3.95 crore for over five years.
“The Accounts Officer of Directorate of Floriculture Kashmir stated (June 2014), that funds were released in March 2010 and were withdrawn from the treasury to avoid lapsing,” it said, adding thus, failure of the departmental authorities to identify an agency for establishment of cold store at Tulip Garden Srinagar resulted in blockade of funds to the extent of Rs 3.95 crore for over five years and avoidable expenditure of Rs 1.63 crore on purchase of tulip bulbs. The matter was referred to the Government in May 2015,” the CAG said.
Director Floriculture, Kashmir stated in (July 2015) that to ensure good quality of bloom at tulip garden fresh tulip bulbs were procured every year and that Mechanical Department had furnished DPR for construction of 37.5 MT capacity Tulip Bulb Cold Store at a cost of Rs 1.91 crore.
“The reply was not convincing as despite lapse of over five years the cold storage was not established and funds amounting to Rs 3.98 crore continued to remain in the Civil Deposit Head,” concludes the CAG report.
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