The Congress launched a coordinated attack by the national and state leadership on the BJP government in Madhya Pradesh, accusing it of “collecting 50 per cent commission from petty contractors.”
The attack is reminiscent of a similar “40 per cent corruption” attack on the BJP government by the Congress in Karnataka during the recent assembly polls.
The allegations, which have been taken up by the party’s national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and general secretary in-charge of communications Jairam Ramesh at the national level, are based on a viral letter that is supposed to have been written by a Gwalior-based association of petty contractors to the chief justice of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, through its Gwalior bench. The BJP has, however, called the letter “fake”.
The ‘letter’ was first shared by former Madhya Pradesh Congress president Arun Yadav on Thursday on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter). Yadav wrote: “This is proof that no payment is made to any contractor in Madhya Pradesh without giving 50%. Madhya Pradesh's Small Contractors Association wrote a letter to the Chief Justice, (that) in Madhya Pradesh, payment is received only after paying 50% commission. Chief Minister Shivraj (Singh Chouhan) ji, is this game going on under your supervision?’
In the letter, signed by ‘Gyanendra Awasthi’ (no designation mentioned) of ‘Laghu evam Madhyam Shreni Samvidakari Sangh’, it has been alleged that the petty contractors, who are subcontracted the work by original contractors, have to work for just 40 per cent of the original contract value, as the contractors have to pay 50 per cent money as ‘commission’ and keep 10 per cent money for themselves. The 50 pc commission is paid by the main contractor to get the payment of the work released.
The petty contractors are involved in road, buildings, ponds and other government construction works.
The letter stated that huge payments of petty contractors for old works have been due for the past several months with no budget allocated for the purpose in various districts. It mentioned that a delegation of the petty contractors met the chief minister recently with the issue and the CM had spoken to his OSD (office on special duty) to resolve it. However, the OSD reportedly told the association members that 50 per cent of the commission taken was used “as party expenses in the election year”.
The letter said earlier 15-20 per cent commission was taken, which was acceptable, but the 50 per cent commission was meant to force the contractors to compromise with the quality of the work and to harass them.
The letter demanded a probe into the issue by a High Court judge and the release of the pending payment.
Using the newspaper cutting based on Yadav’s allegations related to the letter, Priyanka Gandhi, on Friday, said on X platform: “The union of contractors in Madhya Pradesh has written a letter to the Chief Justice of the High Court complaining that payment is received only after paying 50% commission in the state. The corrupt BJP government in Karnataka used to collect 40% commission. In Madhya Pradesh, BJP has gone ahead to break its own record of corruption. The people of Karnataka ousted the government with 40% commission, now the people of Madhya Pradesh will remove the BJP government with 50% commission from power.”
Ramesh wrote: “BJP had a government with 40% commission in Karnataka. The BJP government of Madhya Pradesh is even a step ahead of that. Here the matter of 50% commission is coming to the fore. Just like the people of Karnataka removed the corrupt BJP government, similarly the people of Madhya Pradesh will also throw out this corrupt government from power.’
Quoting Gandhi’s tweet, MP Congress chief Kamal Nath posted on X: “Respected Priyanka ji, you have exposed the demon of corruption spread in Madhya Pradesh in front of the whole world and made it clear that how the people of Madhya Pradesh are becoming victims of commission and loot of the ruling party. In Madhya Pradesh, more than 50% commission scam is being done from nutritional food for pregnant women to the construction of Lord Mahakal's complex. In Madhya Pradesh, there is a government of ‘Goshnaveer Natwarlal’ (scammer, making a slew of announcements), which is running on the principle of "give money, take work".
The MP Congress posted several tweets from its X handle on the issue, trying to corner the BJP government on alleged corruption.
The viral letter of allegations has a ‘Vasant Vihar Colony, Lashkar, Gwalior’ address with no contact number. An e-mail address is mentioned, but when THE WEEK sent a mail to the address, it bounced back. Gyanendra Awasthi could not be traced or contacted till the filing of this report.
Madhya Pradesh BJP spokesperson Hitesh Bajpai, while speaking to THE WEEK, said the letter was a fake and the entire issue was a political stunt of the Congress. “As the elections draw near, the opposition will resort to many such tricks, but that won’t work,” Bajpai said.
