NEA board member Laxman Agrawal told Republica that the decision was taken as per the order of the Special Court during initial hearing into cases against NEA officials found involved in irregularities by purchasing transformers of inferior quality.[break]
The NEA officials are believed to have connived with employees of Hubei Sunlight Electric to purchase substandard transformers inflicting loss of Rs 411.84 million on the power utility. NEA had purchased 1,995 transformers from the Chinese firm through two separate contracts in 2009 and 2010.
The firm had replaced 55 transformers last year after they malfunctioned. The board´s decision has paved the way for the Chinese firm to replace all the remaining 1,940 transformers. The company had proposed to the NEA to replace all the faulty transformers following the arrest of its two officials -- Hu Zheng Qiang and Zou Yi Tian on August 21.
A total of 27 NEA employees, including managing director Rameswhor Yadav, are in judicial custody for their involvement in the procurement of substandard transformers.
During initial hearing into the multi-million rupees scam on September 17, the Special Court had ordered NEA to allow Hubei to replace all the transformers by following necessary procedures at the earliest and report to the court accordingly.
After the Special Court order, the Chinese firm on September 11 wrote a letter to NEA, proposing to replace all faulty transformers with the ones with copper winding.
However, it will take many months to replace all the transformers as they have been installed in electric poles in different parts of the country.
The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has filed charge sheet against the officials for embezzling Rs 411.840 million. It has also demanded confiscation of property worth the same amount and sought a penalty worth the equal amount for those involved in the corruption.
While the CIAA has called for a 10-year sentence for all the accused NEA officials, it has demanded additional penalty and sentence in case of the top officials of the public utility as they were the decision makers. It has asked for a two-year sentence for the suppliers.
The court has sought Rs 175 million in bail from Hu Zheng Qiang and sought Rs 15 million from Zou Yi Tian. The court said the Chinese firm had profiteered by supplying substandard transformers, which had aluminum coils instead of copper coils.
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