3 IAS officers undertook luxurious Paris trip on government exchequer, reveals Chandigarh audit report

Chandigarh: Business class tickets, five-star hotel rooms and extravagant expenses. An audit has revealed shocking irregularities in the case of three senior IAS officers.

The trio had gone to France on an official visit in 2015. The audit has raised questions on their unaccounted expenses there.

The three bureaucrats are Vijay Dev, advisor to the then Chandigarh administrator, Anurag Aggarwal, then Chandigarh Home Secretary and Vikram Dev Dutt, then Secretary (Personnel). At that time, former Punjab Governor Kaptan Singh Solanki was holding the additional charge of Chandigarh.

In 2015, the Chandigarh administration received an invitation from the Foundation Lei Corbusier in Paris for a meeting on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Swiss-French architect Le Corbujar. Le Corbuser had prepared the master plan for Chandigarh.

The Chandigarh administration nominated four participants for the event. Approval was sought from the Ministry of Home Affairs for Vijay Dev, Vikram Dev Dutt and Anurag Agarwal.

The tour was programmed and approved. It turned out that the officials approved each other’s visits. Dev’s visit was approved by Dutt and Dutt’s visit was approved by Dev. It was Dev who approved Agarwal’s programme.

The report of the Director General of Audit (Central), Chandigarh, said the invitation was originally meant for one officer Chandigarh’s chief architect, but three secretary-level officers left. That too on the taxpayer’s money.

The report added that the trip was not sponsored by the host foundation and all the expenses were paid by the Chandigarh administration.

The authorities also ignored the rule that no foreign travel of more than five days should be allowed without the approval of the screening committee, it said. The trip was seven days.

The audit report also mentioned how the officials extended the one-day visit to seven days without any approval.