The Central probe agencies have made it clear that they would accept nothing but the original documents related to all aspects of several contracts of the Commonwealth Games from the Organising Committee, headed by Suresh Kalmadi.
The CBI, the Central Vigilance Commission and the Comptroller and Auditor-General have stationed their officials for the past few days at the OC office in a bid to obtain documents related to awarding of various contracts. The officials of all the three agencies, who have been provided space to set up their “offices” inside the building, are insisting on accepting nothing but the original documents related to all contracts, sources said.
While the CBI has been allotted three rooms for its officials on the first floor of the OC building, the CAG officials have been given two rooms on the eight floor of the building to collect all the required documents from the OC. Sources also revealed that the V.K. Shunglu Committee, constituted by the Centre to look into alleged misappropriation of funds and irregularities related to several contracts of the Games, would also start collecting relevant documents from the OC from Monday.
“The CBI officials have also collected agreement documents related to several contracts, including overlays, ceremonies, procurement and technology. The CBI has so far collected agreement documents signed between OC members and private companies of atleast 15 contracts,” sources said. Now, officials of the probe agencies, including the CBI, are collecting only original contract agreements, vouchers, payment slips and other important documents, sources said.
Sources further said, “Probe by the CBI has already revealed that two emails were allegedly forged by the officials of OC to justify the selection of the firms in connection with Queen’s Baton Relay (QBR) held in London in 2009”. Therefore, agencies have refused to take photo-copies of the documents related to the contracts, sources added.
Talking to this newspaper, Chief Executive Officer of the OC, Jarnail Singh, said that he has issued orders asking all the functional heads of the OC to keep only original documents related to the contracts to remove any suspicion of tampering of documents. He said, “I have asked all functional heads to produce only original documents to the probe agencies. One can not deny the fact that zerox copies can be tampered.”