Public Accounts Committee (PAC) chairman Payyavula Keshav said the Andhra Pradesh High Court had, while sanctioning bail to the representatives of Siemens and DesignTech, who were taken into custody by the Enforcement Directorate, made it clear that there was no misuse of funds in the Skill Development Project (SDP), which is in the eye of a political storm following former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s arrest on September 9.
An MoU was signed by the Andhra Pradesh government with Siemens Industrial Software India (Siemens Software) which has units in eight States, including Gujarat, and DesignTech on similar conditions for the same amount in 2015, he pointed, while insisting that the issues raised by the CID in Mr. Naidu’s remand report were irrelevant.
In a press release, Mr. Keshav said the total project cost was ₹3,281 crore, of which Siemens was to provide software worth 90% of the funds. The remaining 10% was to be released by the State government for organising the training programmes through clusters.
