JAISALMER: Serious irregularities involving works carried out under the VB-G RAM G scheme have come to light in Jaisalmer district’s Sam Panchayat Samiti, with suspected financial discrepancies running into crores of rupees.The alleged irregularities reportedly involved manipulation of worker attendance through face-authentication photographs uploaded on the official system.According to information shared with the Rajasthan government during a video conference with the Union Ministry of Rural Development on August 21, around 2.56 lakh cases of duplicate photographs were detected in connection with workers’ face authentication across Rajasthan.Of these, around 2.05 lakh cases were reported from Jaisalmer district alone, making it the district with the highest number of such cases.Following the findings, the state government constituted a special team headed by Hemant Swaroop Mathur, Additional Commissioner (First), VB-G RAM G, Jaipur, to investigate the matter on the ground.On Sunday, the team, along with four other teams comprising local officials and experts, conducted field inspections at several villages and work sites falling under Sam Panchayat Samiti.During the inspections, officials reportedly found several locations where workers were not present at the work sites. In some cases, there were also allegations that payments had been released despite the absence of actual work.The findings have now brought the role of concerned officials and employees under scrutiny.The data gathered so far indicates a large number of duplicate face-authentication photographs in villages under Sam Panchayat Samiti.The reported figures include 59,715 cases in Pochina, 45,611 in Myajlar, 26,973 in Raghwa, 23,080 in Bairsiyala, 11,000 in Salakha and 15,000 in Sipla, besides cases reported from Kanai and other areas.The VB-G RAM G scheme, which began in its new form from July 1, uses the government’s NMMS mobile application for recording attendance and monitoring rural employment works.Officials suspect that technical vulnerabilities in the system may have been exploited. There are also allegations that data may have been entered through another application by bypassing or manipulating the official system.Hemant Swaroop Mathur said that five teams conducted ground-level inspections in Jaisalmer on Sunday. He said that information had emerged from some locations suggesting that payments may have been made even where work had not actually been carried out.Mathur said the investigation is still underway and that the final findings will be communicated only after all field reports are compiled and submitted to the state government.He further said that discrepancies had been detected in the NMMS application, including attendance being recorded despite workers’ photographs or evidence of completed work being unavailable.Several such entries have reportedly been rejected during scrutiny.Officials are also examining allegations that a duplicate mobile application may have been used to enter data into the official system and that attendance could have been marked remotely, allegedly even when the person recording attendance was outside the prescribed 50-metre radius.The special team’s detailed report is expected to establish the extent of the alleged irregularities, the amount of public money involved and the responsibility of officials or other persons found connected with the suspected manipulation.
