File picture of the concluding ceremony of the 33rd National Games at the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium in Guwahati

Guwahati, July 15: The CBI has quizzed Assam government officials connected with the 2007 National Games held in Assam over a sponsorship amounting to Rs 1 crore.

The money, taken from a public sector undertaking in the power sector by an event management company for the Games, had never reached the Games authorities.

The event management company apparently returned the money to the organisation early this year but the CBI is continuing the probe to ascertain what had actually happened and whether the staff of the organisation were involved.

Confirming the development, sports minister Bharat Narah said a CBI team had sought permission to quiz officials and check sponsorship records of the Games, which the government has granted.

Although the money has been returned, the minister said, “As far as I know there is no record of the Rs 1 crore that the event management company had received from the organisation. The file came to me and I forwarded it to the chief minister for necessary permission,” he said.

Narah refused to name the organisation saying, “Since a probe is on by a central agency, I do not know if I should give out the name of the organisation.” He said the budget for the Games had put the total sponsorship money at Rs 4.5 crore. “Had the contribution been deposited, it would have been Rs 5.5 crore.”

According to Narah, the audit of funds used for organising the National Games is still on and the report will be submitted soon.

Sports department officials said the CBI had interacted with their officials and even taken a list of sponsors for their perusal.

They categorically said the organisation in question was not in the list of sponsors.

The anomaly came to light after a pressure group of the employees of the organisation filed a complaint with the CBI late last year.

Sources said what raised the group’s suspicion was that they “saw no branding or nothing similar at the venues or during the Games to suggest that the organisation had dished out Rs 1 crore”.

The organisation even received a “thank you letter” from the Games organisers for being one of the sponsors. The letter was found to be forged and was signed by Avinash Joshi, mission director of the Sarba Siksha Abhiyan. The signature in the letter was also a “fake”.

When contacted, Joshi said a two-member CBI team met him last week. “They took my specimen signature and asked questions related to the sponsorship. The found that the signature was forged.”

He said he was not the convenor of the sponsorship committee when the letter was issued. “Those who forged my signature on the letter thought I still was the convenor.”