The Legal Metrology Department in J&K has failed to modernise the verification of weighbridges besides making recruitment of human resources in the department, the CAG report said.
It said that the poor performance by the department resulted in non-utilisation of crores of rupees besides under-utilisation of modernised interventions in the department.
“The department could not modernise and transform the manual practice of verification of weigh bridges due to which human interface could not be minimised,” the report said.
It said that the department in its report had also acknowledged that the available drivers and other staff were not used to make the mobile testing kits operational.
“These kits have now become scrap as they now do not adhere to the new norms for registration of commercial vehicles and the department could not recover the projected revenue (user fee) of Rs 10 lakh annually since its receipt in 2008,” the CAG said.
It said that the department failed to engage drivers and trained staff for operating mobile cranes fitted with weigh bridge testing kits provided by the Government of India (GoI) for an amount of Rs 1.18 crore which resulted in their under-utilisation and defeated the intended purpose to modernise and transform the manual practice of verification of weigh bridges.
“The Controller Legal Metrology J&K also stated that the vehicle was neither registered with the transport department nor any efforts were made in this regard so far,” the CAG said.
As per the CAG report, the department said that it was able to recover user fee of Rs 17.74 lakh only from 2009 to 2018 which was far less than the estimated collection of user fee of Rs 90 lakh projected in March 2009 by the Deputy Controller, Legal Metrology Jammu by making use of mobile testing kits.
The GoI under the scheme ‘Strengthening of Weights and Measures Infrastructure’ provided two mobile cranes fitted with weigh bridge testing kits for an amount of Rs 1.18 crore to the Legal Metrology Department, J&K.
The Deputy Controller of Legal Metrology Jammu had projected minimum revenue of Rs 10 lakh per annum by using these mobile testing kits.
“But the cranes were not used due to non-availability of drivers and required funds for maintenance. It was put to use for only seven months by obtaining a driver on deputation from the J&K State Road Transport Corporation,” the CAG said.
Despite non-utilisation of the first mobile crane, the department received a second vehicle from GoI in March 2012 which was however put to use only from February 2015 to June 2018 after making internal arrangements for a driver.
“This second mobile crane also remained non-functional since July 2018 due to non-availability of a driver,” the CAG said.
It asked the department to ensure that the required manpower was made available before requisition for machinery was processed for their optimum utilisation.