How Hyderabad lensman got court to act on shady ASI deal

The entire modus operandi and intentions of the ASI officials and PIQL came to light after Ravinder Reddy and Kinsey Bros, who took part in the tender process, moved the court against the decision of the ASI.

Hyderabad: Around one lakh precious estampages would have been at risk of being digitised by an inexperienced player, had it not been for Hyderabad-based photo journalist D Ravinder Reddy of Ravi Press Photo and New Delhi based company Kinsey Bros.

If Reddy and Kinsey Bros had kept quiet and not taken the issue to court, Archeological Survey of India (ASI) officials would have managed to hand over a contract worth Rs.5.62 crore to a Gurugram-based Giopel Import and Export Private Limited (reportedly a shell company with ties to the Norway-based PIQL) on a nomination basis for digitising around 1 lakh estampages preserved in the office of the Director (Epigraphy) by flouting tender norms.

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The entire modus operandi and intentions of the ASI officials and PIQL came to light after Ravinder Reddy and Kinsey Bros, who took part in the tender process, moved the court against the decision of the ASI. Following this, a single bench of Telangana High Court on October 12 set aside the decision of the ASI. Even the Delhi High Court upheld the decision of Telangana High Court.

Ravinder Reddy now has written a letter to the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) requesting it to probe the issue and punish the guilty. He has also sought information about the entire contract and tender process under the Right to Information Act (RTI) to expose the shady deal between ASI officials and PIQL.

It is learnt that if Ravinder Reddy and Kensey Bros have not approached the court and got cancelled the work contract of PIQL, the ASI officials would have handed over several digitising works worth crores of rupees at its various centres across the country to PIQL, on the basis of this work contract causing huge loss to the exchequer.

The tender was initially invited for Rs 1.5 crore and later was escalated to Rs 5.62 crore to benefit PIQL, with ASI officials not considering other competitors including Ravinder Reddy and Kinsey Bros, who have experience and expertise in digitising estampages. In fact, to favour PIQL, the ASI officials compromised with the terms and conditions of the tender.

As per the tender notification, companies applying for the work contract should have an annual turnover of Rs 45 lakh, whereas, as per the balance sheet submitted to the ASI, the PIQL turnover stood at Rs.3.75 lakh for 2020-21. Similarly, previous experience was mandatory to take part in the tender, but the ASI allowed PIQL, which does not have any previous experience of digitising manuscripts.

The ASI officials even transferred the then Director (Epigraphy) Muniratnam Reddy and other officials, who were impressed with the works of Ravinder Reddy and Kinsey Bros, so as to handover the contract to PIQL, which has experience of only storing estampages and not digitising them.

What are Estampages?

Estampages are exact replicas of inscriptions copied from stone or copper plates onto paper using specialised ink and have immense cultural and heritage value. These are made by pressing wet paper onto the rock or metal face and wiping a specialised ink on it. The ASI has a collection of about 70,000 estampages of Sanskrit and Dravidian languages spanning over 135 years.