105 cases worth Rs 137 billion in water ministry, attached departments detected

The Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP) has unearthed 105 cases of irregular expenditure, misuse of public funds, and weaknesses in internal control systems, overpayments and negligence worth Rs 137 billion in Ministry of Water Resources and its attached departments during 2017-18.
Total auditable expenditure and revenue budget pertaining to the Ministry and its entities for the Financial Year 2017-18 under the jurisdiction of Directorate General Audit Water Resources was Rs 175.533 billion and Rs 30.420 billion, respectively. Directorate General Audit Water Resources conducted audit of the 64 per cent expenditure to Rs 112.823 billion and 99 per cent revenue amounting to Rs 30.388 billion on text check basis. Recovery of Rs 6.373 billion was pointed out at the instances of audit and recovery of Rs 803 million was established during the audit year 2018-19. However, recovery of Rs 1.236 billion was effected from January to December, 2018.
According to the report, audit has found 50 cases of irregular expenditure/ unjustified payments and violation of rules amounting to Rs 34.708 billion, three case of misuse of public funds amounting to Rs 132 million, six case of weaknesses of internal control systems amounting to Rs 22.448 billion, 15 cases pertaining to recoveries and overpayments amounting to Rs 7.673 billion and 31 cases of negligence and other related instances amounting to Rs 71.219 billion.
These financial irregularities and financial mismanagement have been recorded in Water and Power Development's water and power sector projects, coordination wing and Indus River System Authority.
The audit report has pointed out that in Kurran Tangi Dam project, an amount of Rs 1.65848 billion ( Rs 888.59 million and Rs 769.88 million) was paid as mobilization advances to M/s Descon and M/s FWO, respectively. At the time of making of payments, income tax amounting to Rs 62.20 million instead of Rs 88.86 million was deducted from the claims of M/s Descon whereas income tax amounting to Rs 76.99 million was not deducted from the claims of M/s FWO, which implies income tax of Rs 103.65 million was not deducted.
Some of the audit paras are as follows: (i) unjustified payment through variation orders due to award of contract without survey and detailed designing of Kacchi Canal Project worth Rs 5.627 billion; (ii) excess payment to the contractors beyond the provisions of Bill of Quantities (BOQ) worth over Rs 2 billion; (iii) loss due to non-recovery of income tax amount deducted by FBR Rs 1.916 billion; (iv) non-recovery of Liquidated Damages from the contractors.
In Wapda, seven contracts amounting to Rs 14.694 billion were awarded to different contractors during June 2005 to January 2017 for execution of various works. The contractors could not complete the works within the stipulated period, resultantly, they were liable to LD of Rs 1.469 billion. However, LD was not recovered.
Likewise, irregularities and financial mismanagement of billions of rupees have been observed in Diamer Bhasha Dam, Dasu Dam, Muhammad Dam, Keyal Khwar, Kurram Tanji and Mangla refurbishment project.