'Civic body gave school upkeep tender to non-existent NGO'

New Delhi: The AAP on Sunday claimed that it had unearthed yet another alleged scam in the running of the North MCD, accusing the civic body of awarding a tender for a school's upkeep in Ashok Vihar to a "non-existent" NGO.

Senior party leader and MCD-in-charge Durgesh Pathak on Sunday said that when their party members decided to look into the NGO that had bagged the tender, they found that it did not even have an office nor did it have any officials.

There was no trace of an office or anyone in-charge. The property is very clearly a residential property with no sign of the NGO — no office, no reception, nothing representing an organisation," the

AAP said.

Pathak said, "The NGO in question was registered in Ashok Vihar area but there's no office or any related official at the location," adding that after having awarded the tender to such an NGO, the civic body was allegedly sending officials to nearby shops and businesses to "extort" money from them for the said NGO.

"MCD usually awards tenders to NGOs for various works but the NGOs themselves are responsible for gathering funds for them. For the first time in history, BJP's corruption has gone to a level where it has officially asked government employees to collect funds for the NGO," the AAP leader alleged.

"This so-called NGO was blindly handed over all the work for MCD schools and the BJP further directed its officers to extort as much money as possible from every single shop in the area in the name of fundraising," the party said in a statement.

Moreover, Pathak said that they would not have discovered this alleged "scam" unless a local shopkeeper had alerted them about it. "A few days ago, the BJP itself slipped up when its MCD officials approached a shopkeeper and said that they were collecting funds for the said NGO. When the shopkeeper refused to pay up, the MCD officers threatened him saying they'll seal the shop," Pathak alleged.