KOLKATA: West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar has taken strong exception to the three-member government committee set up by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for probing the alleged Rs 2,000 crore scam in the purchase of equipment for containing COVID-19 pandemic.
In a letter addressed to the Chief Minister, the Governor said the committee was “a sham and an eyewash”.
The letter, accessed by The Tribune, urged the Chief Minister to institute a judicial probe into the matter.
Following allegations of widespread corruption in the purchase, a three-member committee consisting of additional chief secretary (home), additional chief secretary (finance) and secretary (health) was constituted by the Chief Minister to look into the charges.
In his letter, Dhankhar wrote that the purchase, which included three million PPEs, 3.5 million N-95 masks and four million gloves, among other things, was carried out by health department after rules regarding such purchases were relaxed by the chief secretary by an order.
“It defies reason as to how decision-makers of such tainted purchased of thousands of crores of rupees could themselves be on judgemental mode”, Dhankhar wrote adding that “in view of the obvious conflict of interest, the present investigation (by the three-member committee) would lack any credence”.
The Governor wrote that it was the obligation of the government to get to the root of the alleged scam and bring the guilty to book by exposing the network of “favouritism and patronage”.
The Chief Minister must vindicate her avowed commitment to “transparency and accountability in governance” and order a time-bound judicial inquiry into the scam, Dhankhar wrote to Mamata.
The issue is likely to give the opposition fodder for attacking the government when a two-day session of the state assembly starts its sitting here on September 9.