Delhi: Saurabh Bharadwaj alleges records of his letters as minister missing under BJP govt

New Delhi [India], September 3 (ANI): Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Delhi unit president and former Delhi minister Saurabh Bharadwaj alleged that the file movement record of all letters and notes he sent as minister has vanished from the Delhi government server under the BJP regime, a press release by AAP said.
According to the press release, records missing from the digital system were later found to have been entered in official physical registers, proving that the correspondence existed.
Addressing a press conference on Tuesday, he warned that a minister's official communication disappearing from government servers is an unprecedented and extremely serious matter demanding investigation.
Saurabh Bharadwaj pointed to missing file movement official records, stating, "During my tenure as a minister, all the orders I issued, the file notings, and particularly the directions I gave to officers of my departments, the Health Secretary and the Chief Secretary, the entire file movement record has disappeared from the Delhi government server. The disappearance of all e-movements of records is a very serious matter."
He added, "In July, I filed some RTIs asking several questions. For instance, in 2024, as minister, I had ordered the Chief Secretary to conduct a third-party audit of the desilting of drains. I asked what action the Chief Secretary took on those orders. Was the audit of desilting done or not? The shocking reply to the RTI was that none of the notes I sent as minister were ever received by the Chief Secretary. I filed three to four RTIs, and in all the replies, it was stated that the Chief Secretary had not received any such note."
Explaining what happened next, Saurabh Bharadwaj said, "I appealed against the RTI responses, and the hearing for that appeal was scheduled on Tuesday. I went to the Secretariat for the hearing. When we checked the government's file management system by entering the reference numbers of several files, we found that all the file movement records of notes I had sent to the departments, the officers, and the Chief Secretary were missing from the server."
"After this, I looked at the physical entries recorded in the register. Whenever a minister sends a note from one department to another, it is dispatched in the register. The register contains the note number, time, date, the department it was sent from, and the officer in the department it was sent to. Once the note reaches the officer, it is entered in the register maintained there. If note travels further, that too is dispatched and entered in the register," he added.
The AAP Delhi unit chief stressed that the confidential notes whose records are maintained in the computer are also recorded in the physical register at the Chief Secretary's office. If that register goes missing, then the officer under whose authority the register falls is held accountable under the law, the press release said.
Demanding an investigation into the matter, Saurabh Bharadwaj said, "The register provided proof that as a minister I had indeed sent those letters to the Chief Secretary. Evidence of those letters was found in the register at the Chief Secretary's office. But the entire file movement record of those letters was missing from the Delhi government server. This is a very serious issue, and it must be investigated. Until now, we may have heard about many big irregularities, but never has it been heard that in any government, the official correspondence of a minister could simply vanish from the records."
Highlighting the existence of physical copies, he added, "All the letters I sent as minister are still present in the minister's office. On Tuesday, the Deputy Secretary even showed us photocopies of those letters. This confirms that letters were sent from the minister's office to the Chief Secretary. Since the physical record and copies were maintained in the minister's office, they exist. But the entire record of file movement that should have been on the Delhi government server has disappeared."
He claimed that the Chief Secretary's office had requisitioned the letters from the minister's office, which proves that he had written to the Chief Secretary.
Clarifying further, Saurabh Bharadwaj said, "I had ordered the then Chief Secretary to conduct a third-party audit of desilting. A copy of this order is available with the Chief Secretary because it was also physically maintained in the register. The Chief Secretary's office had even requisitioned these letters from the minister's office, and they were present in the registers there as well. But the entire record of file movement is missing. This proves that I, as minister, had indeed written to the Chief Secretary, and those letters exist, but all subsequent records of their movement have been erased from the Delhi government server. No record was found of any of the letters I sent." (ANI)