Gopal Sharma
JAMMU, Mar 8: The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India has detected illegal operation of nearly 407 industrial units in the J&K State and functioning of over 61% private hospitals and nursing homes without authorization (NOC) from the State Pollution Control Board (SPCB).
The team from the CAG’s office which conducted extensive audit and scrutinized the entire functioning the SPCB has pointed out many irregularities, short-comings and wasteful expenditure. The report observed poor utilization of funds by the Board and its management, which resulted in steady increase in the quantum of unspent balances amounting to Rs 17.77 crore as on March 2013.
While the Board failed to upgrade its Labs in Srinagar and Jammu in last more than 15 years and take other measures to improve its functioning, the unspent amount kept lying in five Bank accounts of the Board un-utilized. It also pointed out that the State Government (in Dec 2010) directed the Board to deposit the balance of consent money in excess of Rs 2 crore lying in its non-interest bearing bank accounts into Government accounts in the Treasury. It was also directed that in future also the Board should not retain any amount on this account in excess of Rs 2 crore. The Board had thereafter, used drawls from Treasury as budgeted by the Government while it continued to retain unspent balances of funds raised by it.
The SPCB had utilised consent fee ranging between Rs 26.10 lakh and Rs 91.77 lakh unauthorisedly towards meeting the administrative expenses like travelling allowance, purchase of vehicles, furniture, POL, payment of wages etc from 2009-10 to 2012-13 despite the fact that non-plan funds allotted by the State Government ranging between Rs 12.94 lakh and Rs 3.73 crore were surrendered by the Board during the same period, indicating imprudent financial management.
It was again, detected that the temporary advance of Rs 21.10 lakh received from the Member Secretary by the Regional Directors of Kashmir and Jammu up to March 2009 had not been adjusted as on March 2013.
As per the provisions of the Water (Protection and Control of Pollution) Act 1974, no person shall without the previous consent of the Board establish any industry. Audit noticed that records relating to the number of existing industrial units in the State and units operating un-authorisedly, number of applications received for grant of consent, rejected and details of applications pending for grant of consent had not been properly maintained at the level of Member Secretary or the Regional Offices. The test-check record however, revealed that 407 industrial units in respect of which the validity of consent to operate had expired between March 2001 and February 2013, were running without renewal/ NOC in violation. This illegal operation was going on under the nose of the concerned PCB officials.
It was also pointed out that in Jammu Lab of the Board, out of the 33 parameters required as per general standards for testing of environmental pollutants, only 10 parameters were being tested while most of the cases were being referred to the private labs outside the State. No gaseous samplings analyses was being done due to non-availability of required facilities in the Labs.
The water testing Lab in Kashmir had the facility of analyzing physio-chemical parameters only and no facility for analyzing of heavy metals / pesticides, microbiology and bio-monitoring existed in the Lab. It was observed that out of Rs 69.15 lakh sanctioned/ released by the Government for the purchase of equipment of PCB Labs in March 2003, the Board spent just Rs 4.50 lakh for the said purpose till 2006-07. Moreover, Rs 15 lakhs sanctioned for training/ workshops programme in January 2009 by the Director Family Welfare & RCH, the entire amount was released to the field officers of the Board.
The audit team also noticed that out of 333 private nursing homes/ hospitals in Jammu division only 129 had NOC while other 61 % were operating illegally. In Kashmir, out of 54, only 34 had authorisation from the Board. The audit seriously pointed out that 250 Government Health Centres were treating more than 1000 patients per month, and hardly 30 (7 %) were granted authorisation by the SPCB while all other Government HCEs in Kashmir had no such valid authorization. It was also found that 170 HCEs in Kashmir had violated Bio- Medical Waste Management Rules but going scot free. For ensuring safe disposal of solid / hazardous waste, no Municipal Committee in the State has sought authorization letter/ certificate from Board which is mandatory under PCB rules. Moreover, no such step was found initiated in this regard.
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