How is the central government spending you money? No idea – CAG

Country’s premier auditing body, the Comptroller and Auditor General of India – CAG- has brought in a surprising reply in an RTI filed by a National English Daily. That the current government doesn’t not send its all financial reports to CAG for auditing.>

In simple words, CAG, whose mandate is to monitor the financial performance compliance reports of the government, has not been sent the reports by the central government ministries and its various departments The total number of reports of CAG reports relating to central government ministries and departments came down from 55 in 2015 to just 14 in 2020, a fall of nearly 75%.

It means that the government is not getting its all accounts audited, and there is no accountability of where the public money is being spent. The reports from the Comptroller and Auditor General of India deplore that auditing has come severely come down in last five years. It has raised concerns that the government’s financial accountability is not coming under the CAG’s scrutiny.

CAG was powerful during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s tenure, the CAG says that the power of its reports yield came out starkly during the United Progressive Alliance government of Manmohan Singh.

“The CAG is the supreme audit institution of India and is expected to promote financial accountability and transparency in the affairs of the audited entities,” the CAG had said in its 2019-20 own performance report. CAG’s reports on the 2G auction, coal block auction, Adarsh housing society and the Commonwealth Games of 2010 ruined Singh’s corruption-free image and brought down his government. Riding on which and playing its religious card, the new government came by huge margins, But the CAG reports tabled in Parliament was the highest in 10 years during the early years of the National Democratic Alliance government. But the numbers have fallen increasingly after that, the information through the RTI revealed to a national daily. The RTI reply revealed that even the defence audit reports prepared and tabled in Parliament have also come down during the last few years. While eight audit reports were tabled in Parliament in 2017, it was zero last year. The story is repeated in railway audit reports. In 2017, five reports were prepared but it was only there in 2020.

The CAG is accused of being unusually soft and lenient to this government. The impact of demonetisation banning the circulation 1000 rupees note, the PM care fund, money collected for the temple have no public accountability. Some officials also believe that it is possible that there may be nothing wrong with the accounts of this government, when examined. But a CAG source claimed to the newspaper that appropriation of finance accounts reports, which are mandatory in nature, are sent every year, the report adds.