AAP leader Manish Sisodia Photo: PTI AAP leader Manish Sisodia Photo: PTI

President Droupadi Murmu has given her approval for the registration of an FIR against AAP leaders Manish Sisodia and Satyendar Jain in an alleged scam of Rs 2,000 crore in the construction of classrooms in Delhi government schools, sources said.

In 2022, the Delhi government's vigilance directorate recommended a probe into the alleged scam and submitted a report to the chief secretary.

The President has given her approval for registering the FIR against Sisodia and Jain in connection with the alleged scam during their tenures as ministers in the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government, the sources said.

The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), in a report dated February 17, 2020, highlighted "glaring irregularities" in the construction of classrooms in Delhi government schools by the Public Works Department (PWD).

The President's approval came under Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act that pertains to "enquiry or inquiry or investigation of offences relatable to recommendations made or decision taken by public servant in discharge of official functions or duties".

Reacting to the development, senior AAP leader Saurabh Bharadwaj accused the BJP of carrying out a witch-hunt against its political rivals.

The BJP has no interest or intention to fulfil the promises it made to the people of Delhi. Its only agenda is to carry out a witch-hunt against its political rivals to stifle the voice of people, the former minister said in a statement.

The BJP-led central government has already decided to prosecute every political adversary of the party and grant approvals to move the case forward but it should wait for the judicial process to begin, he said.

Yechury was foremost among the CPI-M leadership to realise the need for a course correction. He was convinced that the emergence of Hindutva and Narendra Modi called for a new political vocabulary and alignments. He was honest enough to understand that the CPI-M’s traditional antipathy towards Congress will not help the Left in its task of countering the BJP. It is well known that a good section of CPI-M leaders opposed his push for joining hands with the Congress at the national level. He pursued his mission despite the lackadaisical support from his party colleagues. He played a key role in forming the INDIA bloc ahead of the 2024 general elections. The CPI-M Politburo has acknowledged this in its homage to the departed leader. “In the recent period, Sitaram Yechury devoted a lot of his time and energy towards forging a broad unity of the secular opposition parties, which took the shape of the INDIA bloc,” it said. The Politburo has also described him as “one of the key interlocutors for the CPI(M), which was supporting these coalitions”.

In July 2019, BJP leader Harish Khurana and then AAP rebel MLA Kapil Mishra, now a minister in the Delhi government, lodged a police complaint about the alleged scam.

According to a report prepared by the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of the Delhi government, the complainants alleged that there was a scam worth over Rs 2,66jogo000 crore in the construction of classrooms and school buildings in Delhi. The work was done at a highly inflated cost by the Delhi government.

The alleged scam involves the construction of around 12,748 classrooms.

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The ACB report said the total expenditure incurred for constructing the classrooms and school buildings was around Rs 2,892.65 crore. They were allegedly constructed at the rate of Rs 8,800 per square feet, whereas it was common knowledge that the average construction cost (even for a builder of flats) was around Rs 1,500 per square feet.

The total cost for constructing a classroom and school building, according to the tender awarded, was allegedly around Rs 24.86 lakh per room, whereas such rooms are easily constructed in Delhi at around Rs 5 lakh per room, it said.

The prices were increased almost five times to defraud the taxpayer by siphoning off money from the public exchequer in the garb of construction cost, the report said.

Even for a 5-star hotel, top ultra-luxury quality construction is around Rs 5,000 to Rs 5,500 per square feet, it said.

The complainants submitted a copy of documents in which information received under the RTI Act in respect of the construction of 18 classrooms in the Govt Girls Senior Secondary Schoolalfapg, Nathupura, Burari (school ID:-1207111) revealed that they were constructed at a cost of Rs 12 crore, the ACB report said.