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Tolls being gobbled up

Probe finds vehicles crossing Bangabandhu Bridge without records; heavy vehicles shown as light ones; role of toll collection company comes under question

M Abul Kalam Azad, Back from Bangabandhu Bridge
A probe has found that employees of a joint venture company collecting tolls at Bangabandhu Bridge have been misappropriating huge sums by showing a lesser number of vehicles crossing the bridge or by showingheavyvehicles as light ones.
The Bangabandhu Bridge Authority (BBA) last month at random scrutinised last year's toll records for three months — January, February and December -- and found that Tk 11.93 lakh had been misappropriated by hiding real data
on the computer and duplication of money receipts.
The actual amount of the embezzled money will be known when a full-fledged audit is done, said BBA officials.
Every day's toll records were supposed to be checked in line with video footage of every vehicle crossing the bridge to prevent irregularities. But it did not happen owing to the negligence of the people concerned.
The government can cancel a contract with a toll collection company for such irregularities. But the
company is yet to face any action even a month after the irregularities came to light, as it is backed by a state minister and the general secretary of an associate body of the ruling party, said a source.
Bridge Division Secretary Khandaker Anwarul Islam said steps would be taken once he got the complete probe report.
BBA Assistant Engineer Khairuzzaman, who supervises toll collection at the bridge, said, “Misappropriation of tolls is not possible without the involvement of the
company's high-ups. Only a few collectors alone will not dare to do it.”
In November 2010, a joint venture of Shamim Enterprise Ltd, United Development Corporation of Bangladesh and Goangxi Scientific Institute of Communications, China, was assigned to collect tolls for five years. The company will get Tk 14 crore for its service during the period.
Built on the river Jamuna at a cost of Tk3,700 crore, the country's largest bridge was opened to public in 1998. The average daily traffic on the bridge is between 10,000 and 11,000 from which the BBA earns around Tk 90 lakh.
The toll for a large vehicle is Tk 1,400, a medium truck Tk 1,100, a small truck Tk 850, a large bus Tk 900, a small bus Tk 650, a car or jeep Tk 500 and a motorbike Tk40.
The BBA checked images, data and money receipts, and found that toll collectors Arafat Hossain, Jubair Alam, Rajib Hossain and Emanul Kabir misappropriated tolls by hiding the real number of trucks on December 7 and 16.
On December 7, they submitted tolls for 152
trucks crossing the bridge while the actual number was 202. On December 16, they showed 212 trucks instead of 262.
The company then sacked its four toll collectors and filed a case against them with the Jamuna Bridge West Police Station on January 4.
Similar irregularities were detected in last year's toll records of January and February.
On February 12, the company told local journalists that it had sacked 11 staff. But The Daily Star found that they were actually transferred to toll booths at Lalanshah, Rupsha and Kanchan bridges.
One of them talked to The Daily Star and maintained his innocence. The employee, now posted at Lalanshah bridge, said the company had asked them to return the "embezzled money,” but they refused.
1\vo others said the company had told them "not to worry”.
The company’s manager Safat Quader said he was unaware that the toll collectors had been transferred to other bridges. Earlier, he had claimed before the media that the guilty staff had been sacked.
He said the company would return the misappropriated money to the BBA.
Quader refuted allegations of senior officials' involvement in corruption, and said, “We sack staff whenever we find their involvement in corruption.” HOWIT HAPPENED
On condition of anonymity, a toll collector told The Daily Star how the irregularities had taken place.
"After the company got the job, some of its senior officers sent dozens of their men to toll booths at the bridge for so-called training. After a few days, these officers asked the regular collectors to leave the booths in the middle of their shifts, and let the trainees do the job. That was how it started to happen."
These recruits in collusion with their superiors then started misappropriating tolls, said sources at the BBA and the company.
"We were given 10 percent of the tolls we misappropriated," an accused toll collector told The Daily Star. “If I stole Tk 20,000,1 would get Tk 2,000. But we eventually started cheating our superiors and hid the actual amount we misappropriated."