Audit flags irregularities: Panjab University leased kiosk for a song

The office of the principal director and audit has found irregularities in the lease of a kiosk awarded to an eatery on the Panjab University campus without following proper bidding process, causing a loss of Rs 5.78 lakh to the varsity exchequer. 

The kiosk (shop number 12 at Student Centre) was allotted to Mamma Mia eatery, owned by Sanjeev Mehta. The audit team has demanded explanation from the authorities concerned as why proper procedure was not followed in this case.

The report says that the committee constituted for this probably ensured that no other service provider was available for bidding. The audit report sent to the PU registrar has demanded justification behind changing the committee members without the approval the vice-chancellor despite his having screened the panel before.

 The audit report says the eatery was allotted at a monthly rent of Rs 14,675 in October 2014 on a simple request while another eatery (Pakhwan, shop no 2) was rented out at Rs 46,811 monthly rent after bidding process.

Must read | ‘UGC may convert Panjab University into a resort’

The assistant audit officer sought the reason behind fixing such a low rental. 

Flags guest faculty issue

The audit report has also observed that the university departments should get approval from the competent authority (V-C) before hiring guest faculty. It says the departments should have a fair idea of how many people they will be hiring as guest faculty before the academic session starts keeping in mind the vacant posts they have.

It further says in case the prior approval of the competent authority is not obtained, the guest faculty should get ex-post-facto sanction from the V-C for lectures they deliver.

Alterations detected in salary bills 

The audit has observed that there are several instances of overwriting in the salary bills of staff, which may lead to errors while transferring salaries to the bank accounts of beneficiaries. The salary bills are prepared in a software developed by the university by spending lakhs of rupees.