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IRREGUALRITIES GRIP ASSAM AGRICULTURAL UNIVERSITY
After 42 years of the establishment of this premier institute, these expectations have been proved wrong as a recent report published by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India has brought to light massive irregularities in the university and the CAG has passed a very caustic comment in stating that the University has “failed to live up to its mandated requirements to the full extent.”
The CAG report that was tabled before the Assam Legislative Assembly recently has identified major anomalies in both the academic and financial sectors of the institute. It has identified severe financial irregularities due to absence of any system of internal control and maintenance of mandatory records of accounts, budgetary and expenditure control, sending of inflated utilization certificates to the funding authorities without incurring expenditure, failing of enrollment of students up to its intake capacity, overall shortage of 39 per cent of faculty members, poor placement record, and incomplete projects are major setbacks to the successful running of the university.
Financial irregularities:
(1) Utilization Certificate:
According to the findings of the CAG report, AAU has issued utilization certificates (UCs) to the Government and Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) against the receipt of grants-in-aid of Rs. 447.78 crore during 2005-09, showing utilization of entire grants by March 31 of the respective years. Surprisingly, AAU did not spend the entire grants and sometimes even a part of it in the respective years. Citing examples, the report has found that ICAR released Rs. 2.05 crore during 2005-06 for repairing and renovation of hostels, laboratory and academic blocks of the University under the scheme ‘Strengthening and Development of Agricultural Education’ for execution of 19 works for the year. The Vice-Chancellor accorded his approval in August 2006, whereas in the audited UCs issued by a Chartered Accountant along with annual accounts of the University the entire amount of Rs. 2.05 crore was shown as utilized during 2005-06.
Again, the annual accounts during 2006-07 and UCs along with a statement of expenditure furnished to the funding agencies disclosed that the University during 2006-07 incurred an expenditure of Rs. 5.86 crore towards construction and repairing of buildings through the Director of Physical Plant (DPP), AAU, Jorhat. However, the DPP’s records disclosed in June 2010, that only Rs.13.37 lakh was spent for the purpose during the year. Thus there was excess report of expenditure to the extent of Rs. 5.73 crore.
Similarly, AAU issued UCs for Rs. 14.94 crore received during 2008-09 (under Rastriya Krishi Vikash Yojana Rs. 10 crore and development grant of ICAR Rs. 4.94 crore). The actual expenditure out of Rs. 14.94 crore during the year was only Rs. 3.50 crore (RKVY: Rs. 1.82 crore and development grant of ICAR: Rs. 1.68 crore) resulting in excess issue of UCs for Rs. 11.44 crore according to the report.
Additionally, during 2006-10, 68 cheques for Rs. 3.43 crore issued on March 31st could not be disbursed due to non-receipt and non-installation of machineries and equipment. Of this, 31 cheques became time barred, which were revalidated subsequently, but the entire amount was exhibited in annual accounts as expenditure and utilization certificates were issued to avoid lapse of budget grants.
Thus, while revealing these allegations the report has stated that, “inflated UCs were sent to the fund sanctioning authority to secure release of subsequent grants without adjusting unspent balances of grants for previous years. Besides this, actual closing balance under each scheme was not ascertainable from the unsystematic records and, therefore, diversion or misutilization from the closing balance can not be ruled out. In reply AAU stated (October 2010) that the fund was received in the later half or at the fag end of the financial years and therefore the University had no choice but to resort to furnish inflated UCs to serve the better interest of the people of the state. The reply is not tenable as this practice is against prudent financial discipline.”
(2) Misappropriation of funds:
The CAG report has also found that, during 2008-10 there was misappropriation of funds amounting to Rs. 39.42 lakh of salary expenditure through fraudulent drawal by inflating the total figure in the pay bill through willful wrong calculation. Thus, due to lack of internal control and non-executing prescribed checks such as checking numerical calculation of the pay bills by supervising officers and DDO at various stages, the fraudulent drawal could be done by the accountant.
Again, during 2000-04, Rs. 33.63 lakh was misappropriated by the then Dean, Faculty of Agriculture which had not been recovered in full. An amount of Rs. 3.83 lakh is yet to be recovered as on October 2010. The recurrences of misappropriations indicate serious lapses in the internal control mechanism of AAU, the report states.
In reply, AAU stated on October 2010 that steps were being taken to recover Rs. 3.83 lakh from the Ex. Dean Faculty of Agriculture and Rs. 30.42 lakh from the Junior Accountant, the report adds.
(3) Non-utilization of fund:
The CAG audit observed that during 2005-10, the Director of Extension Education failed to utilize the funds as per allocation. As such, the funding agency (ICAR) released funds after adjustment of previous years’ unspent balance resulting in non-receipt of fund of Rs.7.18 crore and denial of training facilities and other extension activities to the farmers to that extent. The details are:(Rs. in Crore)
| Year | Allocation | Opening balance | Grant received |
Total | Expenditure |
Balance |
| 2005-06 |
4.46 |
4.08 |
4.25 | 8.33 | 4.16 | 4.17 |
| 2006-07 |
8.76 |
4.17 |
4.17 | 8.77 | 8.54 | 0.23 |
| 2007-08 |
0.12 |
0.23 |
9.91 | 10.14 | 8.49 | 1.65 |
| 2008-09 |
8.92 |
1.65 |
7.27 | 8.92 | 8.05 | 0.87 |
| 2009-10 | 11.17 | 0.87 |
10.22 | 11.09 | 9.94 | 1.15 |
| Total | 43.43 |
36.25 | 39.18 |
Source- CAG report
(4) Diversion of fund:
The CAG report has also found that prior to 2004-05, the University authority received Rs. 4 crore towards arrear payment of UGC scale, setting up of sericulture college and for sericulture research. The said amount was shown as opening balance in the receipt and payment account for each year during 2005-10. AAU however stated that the amount had already been transferred to general fund account and spent for meeting the expenditure under salary prior to 2004-05. “Thus, the fund was not spent for the purpose for which it was released and was diverted for other purposes without any approval from the fund releasing authority,” it adds.
Further during 2007-08, ICAR released grants of Rs. 17 crore for ‘Strengthening and Development of Agricultural Education’ of which Rs. 5 crore was specifically released for the College of Fisheries, Raha, Nagaon. But AAU provided only Rs. 2.09 crore to the college and the balance of Rs. 2.91 crore was diverted to other units, according to the report.
During 2006-07 AAU released grants of Rs. 28.14 lakh under ICAR Development grants to the College of Veterinary Science, Khanapara for repair and renovation of hostels and academic blocks and construction of retaining/boundary wall at girls’ hostel. But instead of utilizing the entire funds for the purpose, Rs. 19.57 lakh was diverted to works of other schemes without any approval of the funding agency.
As a result of such diversion, the works or tasks planned, proposed and sanctioned, keeping in view a definite objective had not materialized and the objective remained unachieved. In reply, AAU admitted to the fact of diversion of fund and stated in October 2010 that Rs. 2.91 crore in respect of development of College of Fisheries, Raha was not yet diverted but retained in hand. The CAG has alleged that, “the reply is not acceptable as the allocation for relevant amount had already been made to other college/unit.”
