Following the revelation of corruption worth millions at Lahore Electricity Supply Company (LESCO), FIA Lahore arrested the project director of LESCO Construction Circle and registered a case against its 39 senior officers.
The LESCO officers are accused of having released goods worth more than Rs. 340 million from the store instead of Rs. 190 million for eleven different projects. The officers who have been booked include a project director, 11 XEN, 13 SDOs, 9 line superintendents, and some accounts officers.
An amount of 190 million was sanctioned for the commencement of work on 11 projects. It should be noted that it was stipulated that in case of increase in the cost or completion period of the projects, the prior permission of the competent authority has to be obtained to obtain more material or funds.
According to the FIR, Project Director Construction Circle LESCO asked to start work on the said projects.
The work started, and the equipment was to be installed at the site of these eleven projects, but interestingly, the equipment was installed in only a few places, and the rest of the equipment was disappeared by the above-mentioned officers.
The FIA received information from its sources and started an investigation. When the investigation team visited the projects, the officials could not prove the use of the said equipment during the site visit.
Rather, site inspection revealed all plans to remain incomplete.
While the officers claimed that all the projects had been completed, The FIA investigation found the LESCO officers guilty, after completing the investigation, a case was registered, and the project director was arrested.
According to the FIA, goods worth more than Rs. 110 million were released by misuse of powers.
From the line superintendent to all concerned officers of LESCO involved in the alleged corruption, the FIA investigation spoke.
According to FIA investigators, payments were made to LESCO’s field stores and contractors before the work began. Due to the undue delay in the work, the cost of the project also increased enormously. FIA has arrested Project Director Construction Muhammad Farooq.
Among the XENs whose names were included in the FIR were Faisal Afridi, Ahmed Fawad, Asadullah Butt, Numan Ghani, Muhammad Iqbal, Abdullah Shabbir, Zubair Sarwar, Shahid Naveed Chatta, Shahid Malik, Muhammad Naeem, and Ali Hassan, while the SDOs include Aamir Raza, Tafsir Ahmed, Saad Mehdi, Muhammad Akram, Saqib Manzoor, Basheer Ahmed, Shahid Manwar, Tanveer Ahmed Khan, Kashif Rehan Khosa, Zulfiqar Ali, Rana Wasim, Adil Naseem, and Manzoorul Hasan. The names of the line superintendents are Muhammad Ramzan, Babar Ali, Amir Razzaq, Asif Mehmood, Hamza Anwar, Nasrullah, Kashif Majeed, Aleem Jafar, and Yasin Maskin. Apart from this, Umar Farooq and Aqib Siddiq are accountants.
The names of divisional accountants Mohammad Naeem and Ijaz Mughal are also included in the FIR. All the officers are alleged to have made irregularities in the new and old material.
Also made illegal payments to contractors and the LESCO store before the completion of work. They are also facing charges of creating completion reports on fake forms, in addition to eight types of irregularities.
The FIA arrested the project director, obtained a four-day remand, and was conducting raids for the arrest of the remaining accused.
