BMC

Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis

civic body

Congress legislator Aslam Shaikh

corporator Asif Zakaria

Firm against whomfiled a police complaint last year wins Rs 120-cr garbage transport contract.Less than a week afterordered a probe into the BMC’s garbage transport scam, the’s Solid Waste Management (SWM) department picked a tainted contractor Ms MK Enterprises (JV) for a Rs 120-crore contract. The Shiv Sena-led civic standing committee cleared the proposal on Wednesday amid opposition from the Congress.In August last year, the BMC filed complaints against Ms MK Enterprises in Vikhroli and Kurla police stations. The contractor had mixed construction debris with garbage on eight occasions, according to the BMC’s complaint. During a surprise inspection, the BMC had found 3-6 bags of debris in dumper trucks that ferry garbage.According to BMC’s formula for blacklisting, those who are caught more than five times can be blacklisted. “In MK Enterprise’s case, they were caught eight times, but bills were not raised for the eight times they were caught. So this firm did not fit into the formula,” explained a civic official. The firm will now transport garbage in the K-West ward that comprises of areas like Andheri (West) and Juhu.fumed, “The BMC has turned the garbage transport scam into a joke. They said that they would blacklist contractors who cheated it five times but Ms MK Enterprises has duped the BMC eight times. Instead of penalising the contractor, the BMC is giving him a Rs 120 crore gift.”After Shaikh raised the issue of tainted firms bagging new contracts in the state legislative assembly last week, Fadnavis announced that an enquiry will be conducted.Earlier this month, the Sena-led standing committee had rejected the BMC’s proposal to award garbage contracts worth Rs 500 crore to ‘tainted’ contractors against whom the BMC had filed police complaints for mixing debris with garbage. But on Wednesday, the Sena took a U-turn and pushed Ms MK Enterprise’s contracts. Congress corporator Ravi Raja also voiced his parties’ opposition to the contract.“We had opposed giving any work to any tainted contractors. If the BMC has filed a police complaint, they must follow it up or withdraw the complaint. Just keeping those pending makes no sense. This is a complete failure of the BMC’s SWM department.”His party colleague,added, “Only a few weeks ago, due to our opposition, the standing committee rejected proposals to tainted contractors of the garbage scam. But today, they gave a contract to one of those same contractors. Are they giving backdoor entry to all of them?”When asked why a controversial contractor was issued contract again, Sena group leader Yashwant Jadhav said, “The administration told us on record that there is no FIR against this particular contractor and therefore, it should be allowed. That is why we have given approval.”