BHUBANESWAR: The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) has uncovered serious financial irregularities, procedural lapses, and unauthorized expenditures in the High School Transformation Programme (HSTP)—a key flagship initiative launched under the previous BJD-led state government's 5T initiative.
The audit report highlights widespread mismanagement of public money, unauthorized fund allocations, duplicate procurements, and non-functional infrastructure created under the transformation project.
Ineligible Expenditure and Diverted Allocations
According to the CAG report, the state authorities improperly diverted government funds meant exclusively for high school transformations to non-eligible entities. Notably:
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Ineligible Grant: A total sum of ₹57.95 lakh from the High School Transformation Programme (HSTP) fund was allocated and spent on Badachana Women’s Higher Secondary School, which was a private educational institution and entirely ineligible for funding under the scheme guidelines.
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Suspected Misappropriations: The audit flagged suspected misappropriation of funds in multiple districts. At Ranihat High School in Cuttack, ₹12.48 lakh drawn from HSTP and Mo School Abhiyan funds was red-flagged. Another ₹30 lakh was suspectly transferred through cheques to a third-party account instead of the block development officer (BDO) at Nandipur High School in Jajpur.
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Fake Claims: In Jaleswar, Balasore district, a fraudulent payment of ₹4.95 lakh was uncovered, where BDO officials submitted false claims toward repairs of school furniture.
Unchecked Procurement and Excess Spending
The CAG severely criticized the procurement protocols followed by executing agencies during the transformation drive:
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Dual-Desk Procurement Violations: Sixteen sampled executing agencies purchased dual desks worth ₹42.71 crore using quotation call notices or direct nominations, explicitly violating standard finance department guidelines and competitive bidding rules. This improper procurement strategy led to an avoidable excess expenditure of ₹24.30 crore.
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Duplicate e-Content Purchase: The audit exposed a total waste of ₹7.39 crore due to a lack of coordination between the Odisha School Education Programme Authority (OSEPA) and district officials. Duplicate e-learning content was purchased from EdCIL for 430 schools in Jajpur district, despite OSEPA having already procured identical content.
Infrastructure Lying Idle and Unusable
Beyond financial leakage, the audit conducted physical inspections across several transformed schools and found that modern infrastructure existed only on paper:
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In 54 sample schools, newly built smart classrooms and science laboratories were rendered completely non-functional due to basic missing infrastructure—including lack of water, LPG connections for labs, basic chemicals, equipment, and reliable internet connectivity.
The findings have sparked strong political and public debate in Odisha over oversight, execution standards, and public accountability in large-scale education infrastructure programs.
