Wilson John
The Frontier Works Organisation (FWO), a premier Pakistan Army
infrastructure organisation, is suspected to have benefited illegally from the
important Kartarpur Sahib Corridor, a key diplomatic initiative between India
and Pakistan.
According to the Auditor General of Pakistan, in its latest report, FWO was
given the contract for the Development of the Kartarpur Sahib Corridor as a
single executing agency without any fair competition for Rs. 16,280 million.
The audit, which took over three years to investigate the case, found little.
The auditors found a gap of Rs. 24 million in payments made to acquire land
for the project. The FWO had refused to share any details with the auditors
for long till the Public Accounts Committee in 2020 had directed the army
agency to submit the details.
An audit scrutiny of the record held at the land office at Shakargarh, it was
revealed that a sum of Rs. 757.874 million was paid for land acquisition. But
when the balance amount for the same was checked from the treasury, a
gap of Rs. 24 million was discovered. When queried, the FWO dismissed the
query by saying that the matter did not relate to the organisation.
The Kartarpur Corridor is a visa-free passage allowing Indian Sikhs to visit a
holy shrine in Pakistan. Established in 2019, the corridor connects Gurdwara
Darbar Sahib in Pakistan to Dera Baba Nanak Gurudwara in India. The
corridor’s creation stemmed from discussions between Indian and Pakistani
leaders in 1999.
The important corridor project has also witnessed other suspicious dealings.
There was a suspicious loss of Rs. 18.93 million for the delay in the
completion of independent feeder work. The construction of 11 KV
independent feeder remains pending after the project began two and half
years ago, incurring a loss of Rs.18.926 million.
Likewise, in the Project “Construction of Bridge at Zero Line for Kartarpur
Sahib Corridor”, similar suspicious losses were discovered, pointing to
financial misdemeanour. The contract for Rs. 520.821 million was awarded
to a private firm which the auditor found was irregular. There was no
evidence on record that the bidder provided information with documentary
evidence as required for evaluation of the bidders’ capacity for the execution
of work. The auditor remarked that the rates quoted by the bidder in the first
instance, which were on the higher side, were reduced through negotiation.
The audit maintained the irregularity was due to the violation of public
procurement rules.
Suspicious deals were detected in the construction of the Trainees Hostel
awarded to a firm for Rs. 159.648 million. Although the bidder had quoted a
cost of Rs. 166.146 million, he was persuaded to change the quote to Rs.
159.648 to make it the lowest. However, the firm was paid a total of Rs.
178.795 million on completion of the project two years later, raising suspicion
about malfeasance.