Qaiser Mohammad Ali
In a seemingly highly suspicious and questionable move to apparently stonewall the sharing of the DDCA’s balance sheets, internal audit reports, and compliance documents among his co-directors, DDCA treasurer Ravinder Manchanda has not been providing these, alleged aggrieved directors.
These aggrieved DDCA directors allege that Manchanda had “stopped” the official auditors from sharing these crucial documents with anyone while pointing out that on Wednesday the auditors, VK Bajaj & Company, were ready to share these reports, but backed out, apparently on Manchanda’s instructions.
Cover of the hard-hitting DDCA’s Internal Audit Report 2013-14 that created a storm for highlighting a series of alleged “financial irregularities”.
VK Bajaj & Company had on Wednesday told DDCA’s club secretary Sunil Jain and Dinesh Saini, joint secretary (company affairs), to collect copies of these reports and had also fixed time to meet the two office-bearers. But after “discussing” the issue with Manchanda, the auditors’ firm changed its mind and informed the two officials that they would have to collect the copies from the treasurer.
Till Thursday evening, Manchanda had not provided the reports to Sunil Jain and Dinesh Saini, who are also keeping the BCCI informed.
Several of the 27 DDCA directors said that the auditors were not sharing the documents after a storm was raised over their hard-hitting internal audit report of 2013-14. That report highlighted wide-ranging financial discrepancies, including the allegedly illegal and secret transfer of Rs 1.55 crore out of the DDCA accounts.
Earlier, when Sunil Jain, who is seen by some people as anti-establishment for “legitimately pointing out financial anomalies” in the DDCA, had sought the 2013-14 and 2014-15 internal audit reports from VK Bajaj & Co. in October, he was told in a written reply that the reports had been submitted with DDCA president SP Bansal, Manchanda and DDCA secretary Anil Khanna, and advised him to collect copies from them.
The 2013-14 DDCA internal report, which has been widely publicised, had for the first time exposed behind-the-scenes “money management” by certain DDCA officials, say directors. The disclosures contained in the report also seems to have put pressure on the auditors to not to share any more documents with DDCA officials, they say.
Many DDCA directors say they are not aware if the DDCA had taken any corrective measures and plugged financial loopholes that were exposed by “extremely hard-hitting and damaging” 2013-14 internal audit report. They say they are also not aware if the final 2013-14 balance sheet has been prepared, or it has been submitted with the BCCI, assuming it is ready.
Due to the non-submission of the DDCA balance sheets, the BCCI has withheld the association’s share of the subvention money and other funds due to it. BCCI president Shahshank Manohar, promising to bring in transparency in financial transactions, recently said that he would now get the balance sheets of the affiliated units audited by the newly-appointed PriceWaterhouseCoopers, one of the largest professional services firm in the world.
“Auditors VK Bajaj & Co were ready to give me a copy of the DDCA internal audit report of 2014-15 and gave me two options to collect them from their office. But Manchanda has told the auditors not to give copy,” Saini told JantaKaReporter.com.
“After receiving their email, I told them that we [along with Sunil Jain] would reach their office between 5.30 pm-6.30 pm on Wednesday. After that they informed me that since they have submitted the reports with Bansal, Manchanda and Anil Khanna, I could collect them from them. I approached Manchanda, but he declined to give me the copies,” said Saini. “My question to them is: Why are they hiding these reports? What is in it that they are hiding?”
In its email sent to Saini and Jain, VK Bajaj & Co. wrote, “I have discussed the matter with Mr Manchanda, treasurer of the DDCA, regarding giving you a copy the internal audit reports and he has informed me that you may obtain copy of these reports from him since we have already submitted these reports to DDCA president, general secretary, and the treasurer. In view of the above, please note meeting for today [Wednesday] is cancelled.”
It may be recalled that both Jain and Saini have been questioning the manner in which DDCA’s finances have been handled, alleging that the association’s financial manual was not being followed.
Jain had headed a four-member DDCA’s own fact-finding inquiry committee, constituted on 13 December 2014 to internally probe the findings of the VK Bajaj& Co.’s internal audit report 2013-14, submitted on 30 November 2014, particularly the allegations of “large scale financial irregularities against president SP Bansal and general secretary Anil Khanna”.
The other members of the fact-finding committee, which was constituted by the DDCA executive committee, were Vinod Garg, Salil Seth and Siddharth Singh Verma, all directors of the association.
However, in an unprecedented and audacious move, DDCA general secretary Anil Khanna, who was served a charge sheet by vice-president Chetan Chauhan in the alleged transfer of Rs 1.55 crore, transacted on 30 January 2014, himself moved a resolution by circulation among the DDCA executive committee on 5 November 2014 that this charge be “withdrawn” (Click here to read the original story by www.jantakareporter.com dated 12 November).
Interestingly, while Khanna, in his reply to the show cause notice, had admitted to being a party to the alleged illegal transfer of Rs.1.55 crore. He also wrote that “Bansal had said that the transfer was required to be made at the behest of BCCI” while on Thursday Bansal was quoted by Indian Express as saying that he transferred the amount “so that DDCA could earn higher interest”.
In his written reply to Chauhan, Anil Khanna also disclosed that DDCA treasurer Manchanda was aware of the transfer of money. “It is also not in dispute that Mr. Ravinder Manchanda, Hon. Treasurer, was attending his office regularly, as such this fact was well within his knowledge. I, otherwise, categorically say and submit that the said facts were within the knowledge of Hon. Treasurer and the chief accountant Mr Pritam Panwar since February 2014 itself”.