Vivek Nagpal under CAG scanner for smart card scam

Vivek Nagpal, who was accused by former IPL czar Lalit Modi for money laundering activities, was slammed by the CAG on Tuesday for looting crores of public money in the name of providing Vehicle Registration Certificates (VRC) in smart cards.

It was learnt that the national auditor, while auditing the Transport Department, found that M/s Shonkh Technology International Limited (STIL) owned by Nagpal was assigned by the Delhi government on June 2003 to prepare VRC in smart cards with a charge of Rs 416 per vehicle from the owner.

CAG, in its report placed on Tuesday in the Assembly, observed that STIL did not maintain sufficient stock of blank smart cards. Surprisingly, despite failing to perform (as per the agreement), the Transport Department didn’t terminate the contract and it was allowed to mint money for many years. It was only after massive mismanagement the government terminated the contract on April 21, 2014.

“The pendency of issue of smart cards reached to 1,59,619 and the firm had collected Rs 6.64 crore from the public against these pending cards. Later, the work was issued to Delhi Integrated Multi Modal Transit System Limited (DIMTS) at the rate of Rs 200 per card in April, 2014. Vehicle owner who had earlier paid Rs 416 to STIL were not allowed any credit for the same and they had to pay Rs 200 per card afresh, to the new vendor for the issue of VRCs. This led to extra burden of Rs 3.19 crore on vehicle owners,” CAG observed.

On the context of High Security Registration Plates (HSRP), another company M/s Rosmerta Technologies Limited (named by Modi for its money laundering activities) was criticized by the CAG for failing to perform its work as per the agreement with the Delhi government.