New Delhi, June 6: The Planning Commission has issued a statement in an attempt to explain why it spent 35 lakh rupees on renovating two toilets in its office. "It is unfortunate that what is routine maintenance and upgradation is being projected as wasteful expenditure... The impression is being created that this has been spent on two toilets. That is totally false because these can be used by 10 people simultaneously," states the press release.
Montek Singh Ahluwalia, the Deputy Chairman of the Commission, avoided questions on Wednesday morning about the controversy. The expenditure was revealed by a Right to Information application filed by activist Subhash Agarwal who points out, "Cost of installation of Door Access Control System is Rs. 5,19,426 for two toilets. Cost of renovation of two toilets where door access control system is installed is Rs. 30,00,305."
That amount, Mr Agarwal argues, can provide a flat for a middle class family.
The Commission claims that despite over five lakh rupees being spent on installing a system to limit access to the swanky toilets to those with smart cards, the toilets are not reserved for senior members. "These toilet blocks are meant for shared use and are all being renovated to the same standard. Because there have been instances of pilferages of newly constructed toilets, an access-control system was initially tried, but not found feasible in practice."
Documents accessed through Mr Agarwal's RTI reveal that there were plans to install security cameras in the corridors leading to these toilets to ensure equipment was not stolen. The 35-lakh toilets were, according to plans, to serve as models for upgrading another three toilets in the building at a later stage. (Comment here)
The Commission says in its statement that its office, Yojana Bhavan, is an important public building where over 1500 meetings are held every year; and that the building is over 50 years old and so has been in urgent need of plumbing and sewage repairs. Ministers, foreign dignitaries and journalists, it says, have complained about "the poor quality of toilets in the building," and so the government's Central Public Works Department (CPWD), it says, was asked to renovate at least one toilet block on each floor of the building. (Read: Response from Planning Commission on toilet controversy)
The Planning Commission and its Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia created a major controversy recently over their poverty estimates - they pegged the poverty line at Rs. 28.65 in urban areas, meaning that anyone who spent more than Rs. 28 per day would not be considered poor.
Social activist Nikhil Dey links that controversial statement to the swanky toilet plan. "There is almost everything that is wrong with what was done and with the justification for it. The Planning Commission represents planning for whom, the poor of the country. And there has been a dispute with their figures because there has been a perception with everyone that within the planning commission they have one standard for the poor and another for the rich. They were placing smart cards for entry into those toilets. That privatizes, reduces the number of those who can use it...it's a huge amount of money and it's that same planning commission that not only decides what the poverty line is but also decides on how much money can be spent on a toilet across the country," he says.
Apart from the poverty line estimates issue, Mr Ahluwalia was also criticized recently after a newspaper reported, based on an RTI reply, that Rs. 2.02 lakh a day was spent by him on foreign travel between May and October, 2011. Another report said that he undertook 42 official trips (between June 2004-January 2011) of 274 days at a cost of Rs. 2.34 crore.
Mr Ahluwalia has said the foreign travel was necessary to discharge his official duties.
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