Gurugram: The Nayab Singh Saini government in Haryana has sent charge sheets to 20 officials, including an IAS officer and a senior Haryana Civil Service (HCS) officer, for failing to utilise over Rs 100 crore allocated under the Centre’s Swachh Bharat Mission.
The charge sheets were issued by the Urban Local Bodies Minister Vipul Goel on Monday, after a budget meeting of the Urban Local Bodies (ULB) department in Chandigarh on 5 February. The details of the meeting have emerged now.
Goel did not take calls made to his mobile by ThePrint, but a senior officer of the Haryana ULB Department confirmed the development.
Incidentally, the charge sheets came on a day senior Haryana Congress leader Randeep Surjewala flagged the Union government’s surrender of Rs 1.17 lakh crore from the agriculture budget over six years (2018-19 to 2023-24), which extends to Rs 1.70 lakh crore when the 2024-25 budget is included.
Also, during his speech on the Union budget on Monday, former Union finance minister and senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram raised the issue of underutilisation of central funds for various schemes, particularly those under the urban development department, when people did not have clean potable drinking water and toilets.
The parallel instances of budgetary non-utilisation have sparked questions about fund deployment at both the central and state levels.
A source who didn’t want to be quoted told ThePrint that Chief Minister Saini expressed strong displeasure during the meeting on 5 February when officials failed to provide satisfactory explanations for the unspent funds.
Haryana Urban Local Bodies Minister Vipul Goel subsequently ordered charge sheets against the 20 officials for dereliction of duty.
“The officials present at the meeting could not explain why crores of rupees remained unutilised under the sanitation mission or why no concrete plan had been formulated to deploy these funds,” the senior official of Haryana’s ULB department quoted earlier, told ThePrint. “Following the CM’s intervention, there has been a marked acceleration in scheme formulation and implementation planning.”
Among those facing disciplinary action is Jaideep Kumar, an IAS officer of 2019 batch promoted from the Haryana Civil Services, who served as the state mission director for the Swachh Bharat Mission during the relevant period. He was removed from the post on 31 January and has not been given any new post so far.
The charge of mission director of the Swachh Bharat Mission was given to Shashvat Sangwan, a 2022 batch IAS officer recruited directly through the UPSC. Sangwan too attended the meeting.
Also named in the charge sheets is Haryana Civil Services officer Kanwar Singh, Joint Director of the ULB department, who remained silent when questioned by the chief minister about the fund utilisation lapses.
For 2025, Haryana was allocated a total budget of Rs 342 crore under the Swachh Bharat Mission for sanitation and beautification projects. This allocation was based on approved Annual Implementation Plans (AIPs) and specific projects sanctioned by both the central and state governments.
What a charge sheet means
Under the Haryana Civil Services (Punishment and Appeal) Rules, 2016, a charge sheet is the formal document that kicks off disciplinary proceedings against a government employee. It’s not a mere notice. It’s a legal instrument that tells the accused official precisely what charges they face, line by line.
Once a charge sheet is issued, the official must submit a written reply within a specified time, failing which the department can proceed with the inquiry.
Once the official replies, the government considers the reply, and if found unsatisfactory, the department still proceeds with inquiry and subsequent action, if found guilty of any misconduct, including negligence.
What is Swachh Bharat Mission
Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Swachh Bharat Mission on 2 October 2014, marking Mahatma Gandhi’s 150th birth anniversary. The mission’s thrust was to eliminate open defecation and build toilets in every household across India—both in villages and cities.
Beyond toilet construction, the scheme pushed for changing how people thought about cleanliness and sanitation. It also mandated proper waste handling—separating wet and dry waste and disposing of garbage scientifically rather than dumping it in the open.
The mission runs in two parts: One for rural areas (Gramin) and another for urban areas (Urban). Both the Centre and states share the costs of projects undertaken under the programme.
With the charge sheets now in place, the Haryana government appears determined to ensure accountability in fund utilisation and accelerate the pace of sanitation projects across the state.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)
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