By Krishna Jha
As the masses in the country are suffering from extreme deprivation, under the dark shadows of unemployment and no earnings even to meet the basic needs, there comes the horrific revelation that under Ayushman Bharat, 7.5 lakh beneficiaries were registered with a single mobile phone number. According to the CAG report tabled in the Parliament, insurance claims for fresh treatment were paid against 88,670 already dead persons. There is no exposure on who has been paid the money as it has not gone to the beneficiaries.
In fact from Ayushman Bharat to Dwarka Expressway, there have been seven scams that have been brought to light by the CAG. In reply, there is nothing but silence. The money that belongs to people, returns of their toil, which they pay as taxes, has been squandered, reports CAG.
There have been serious irregularities spotted in the audit of the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) health insurance scheme. The Comptroller and Auditor General of India has revealed that Rs 6.97 crore was paid for the treatment of 3446 patients. All these patients receiving the care and getting treated are actually non-existent, since in the database, they all have been long dead.
The scheme was started in 2018. It was meant to give succour to poor and helpless in rural and urban areas for gaining their health back. During the performance audit, the heading carries the information, “Treatment of beneficiary shown as ‘died’ during earlier claim/treatment, the CAG identified that patients earlier shown as ‘died’ in TMS (the transaction management section of the scheme) continued to avail treatment under the scheme”. The audit noted that there were 3,903 such claims. Madhya Pradesh had 403 such patients for whom Rs 260,09,723 were paid for their treatment. Such reports have been available from other states as well.
According to the guidelines, if a death is there after admission in the hospital, and that too before discharge, payment to the hospital is made only after audit. “During the desk audit (in July 2020), audit had reported to National Health Authority (NHA) that the IT system (TMS) was allowing pre- authorisation request of the same patient who was earlier declared dead under the same system availed under the scheme. NHA while acknowledging the audit comment, stated in July, 2020, that necessary check(s) have been put in place on April 22, 2020 to ensure that PM–JAY ID of any patient who has been shown as ‘died’ in TMS is disabled for availing further benefit under the scheme,” said CAG report.
The report states that when the CAG flagged that the necessary checks were not followed, the NHA stated in August 2022 that “back date of admission is allowed in the system for various operational reasons”. The reply of the CAG over the explanation was that “the reply was not tenable, as pre-authorization initiation, claim submission and final claim approval by the State Health Authority for ‘beneficiaries already shown as died during treatment earlier, indicate flaws in application and make it susceptible to misuse at user level.” The faults in the database of AB-PMJAY include invalid names, unrealistic dates of birth, duplicate health IDs and unrealistic family sizes, the government’s auditor said in a report tabled in Parliament.
Amidst the saga of plunder pours out, another one comes tumbling down. According to the CAG report, it has been revealed that the money meant for the pensions was spent on the publicity campaign of the Swachh Bharat Fortnight in 19 states.
Even the old age people, the widows and the physically challenged people who were entitled to pensions from the rural development ministry were not spared as the money meant for them was diverted and spent on the publicity of some other schemes of some other department.
According to reports released by the government’s auditor earlier this month titled ‘Toll Operations of National Highways Authority of India in Southern India’, toll collection at five toll plazas led to an “undue burden” of Rs 132.05 crore on commuters. For this report, the CAG conducted an audit of 41 randomly selected toll plazas in five southern Indian states.
Among the other findings are the allegations revolving around the Dwarka Expressway and Ayodhya development project, besides the Bharatmala Pariyojana. The Centre’s flagship road development scheme, Bharatmala Pariyojana and the cost of its construction has doubled to over Rs 32 crore per km from Rs 15.37 crore per km, according to the CAG report on ‘Implementation of Phase-1 of Bharatmala Pariyojana’ released last month.
About the flaws in process of tender, no detailed project report was submitted. Rs 3,500 crore was diverted from the Escrow accounts. There were no safety consultants appointed. In its audit of the tourism ministry’s Swadesh Darshan scheme, the CAG pointed out irregularities in the ‘Ayodhya Development project’, which the Opposition cited to allege that the project is “riddled with scams”.
Money has been issued to contractors who are not even registered. GST payments are coming their way. Who are these people? What are they doing? How come the tendering process is so flawed? These were the revelations made by the CAG based on audits and tabled in the Parliament, not any random allegations. (IPA Service)
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