Activist alleges scam but HUDA told advance dates in reports 'just typos'

GURGAON: The HUDA inspection certificates that missing RTI activist Raman Sharma has alleged were issued to a contractor for advance dates were the result of "typographical errors", the institute that issued them said on Tuesday.
In an explanation sent to HUDA administrator Anita Yadav, Shriram Institute of Industrial Research (SIIR) in Delhi, which had issued 16 inspection certificates for work carried out by Brij Gopal Construction Company, claimed it had made the typographical errors.
The RTI activist, who went missing on September 26, had approached the Lokayukta in July for an investigation into the inspection certificates. Before he went missing, Sharma had sent emails to the President, Prime Minister, chief minister and the DGP, claiming HUDA engineers had connived with the contractor in a Rs 1,200-crore fraud in construction of master stormwater and sewerage drains.
Sharma's daughter Vyoma said, "HUDA officials are trying to save their skin by claiming the fictitious inspection reports a result of a typing error. They can make mistakes in one or two reports but fooling the public claiming a typing error in 16 reports is absurd. The truth behind the scam will be known only once the police find my father. I appeal to them to trace him somehow soon."
After HUDA administrator Anita Yadav pulled up her officers and SIIR on Monday, seeking explanation on the certificates, HUDA's executive engineer Jagdish Sorot submitted his reply (TOI has a copy), saying third party-inspections were carried out in the presence of sub-divisional and junior engineers and the contractor. He claimed handwritten field reports were signed by each of these representatives and that it was the typed report by SIIR that got the dates wrong with 2015 written instead of 2014.
SIIR also sent a clarification to HUDA stating the year in the date of visits was misprinted.