The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) alleged on Sunday that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had not discovered anything in 1.5 years despite opening a preliminary inquiry into the charges of a "scam" in the purchase of 1,000 air-conditioned buses by the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC).

The comments were made in the wake of news that the lieutenant governor (LG) had approved a chief secretary's request to file a case with the CBI about the alleged corruption in DTC's acquisition of 1,000 low-floor buses.

“No bus was procured under the procurement plans and no contract was awarded and the process was put on hold after the inquiry started into the process, so there is no question of corruption,” AAP spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj said at a press conference in New Delhi on Sunday.

“Not a single rupee payment was made. The government put the tendering process on hold after the inquiry started; with plans to re-start the process only after the inquiry is over,” he said.

He further stated that the former LG had appointed a three-person committee to conduct an investigation and had given the AAP government a clean bill of health.

“The BJP has been claiming that the AAP government has not procured buses. And whenever the AAP government floated tenders for procurement of buses, the BJP lodged complaints against it because they do not want the buses to be procured,” he said.

Hitting out at the BJP, Bharadwaj said: “Make it clear whether any corruption is there so that the government can scrap it and start a fresh tender. And if there has not been any corruption, we can restart the process.”

He added that the AAP welcomes all kinds of inquiries and investigations. “The AAP MP and MLAs have levelled charges of corruption against LG, but the LG is not ready for probe. The LG threatened us with defamation notices, but we are not afraid, and we will continue to raise questions,” he said.

The LG, CBI, and BJP did not respond right away.

According to a previous PTI report, Delhi LG V K Saxena has given his approval to a request to file a case with the CBI to look into claims of corruption in the DTC's purchase of 1,000 low-floor buses. The CBI is already conducting a preliminary investigation into the incident, and Saxena gave his approval for the latest complaint to be combined with the complaint that the central investigation agency is already looking into, according to the article.

In a letter to Saxena in June of this year, it was alleged that the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) had "premeditatedly" chosen the transport minister to lead the committee responsible for bus procurement and tenders.

The hiring of DIMTS as the bid management consultant for this tender was also alleged to have been done with the intention of facilitating wrongdoing. A July 2019 offer for 1,000 low floors of BS-IV and BS-VI buses and a March 2020 bid for the purchase and annual maintenance contract for low-floor BS-VI buses were both allegedly subject to irregularities.

On July 22, the chief secretary received the complaint and requested opinions and recommendations from the various Delhi government ministries. On August 19, the chief secretary sent in his report, which included a list of "irregularities."

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