Between April 2017 and June 2022, 16 of the Union government’s 59 ministries paid nearly Rs 500 crore to five consultancy firms for several projects including Aadhaar, The Indian Express reported.

The newspaper said that its investigation into records made available under the Right To Information Act revealed that the big five consultancy firms secured at least 308 assignments worth nearly Rs 500 crore from the Centre. These companies are PricewaterhouseCoopers, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited, Ernst & Young Global Limited, KPMG International Limited and McKinsey & Company.

The 16 ministries are: Petroleum and Natural Gas; Rural Development; Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances; Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade; Coal; Electronics and Information Technology; Health and Family Welfare; Skill Development and Entrepreneurship; Defence; Civil Aviation; Public Enterprises; Non-conventional Energy Resources; Power; Road Transport and Highways; Environment, Forest and Climate Change; and Tourism.

The Indian Express reported that the petroleum sector outsourced the most assignments, worth over Rs 170 crore, from the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas and four of its Public Sector Undertakings. This was followed by the power sector as nine organisations under the energy ministry outsourced assignments worth Rs 166.41 crore to consultancy firms.

Other projects outsourced by the Modi government included financial due diligence, retainer for advisory service, hiring technical consultants, evaluation of nominations for e-governance awards, the records accessed by The Indian Express showed.

The government’s public policy think tank, NITI Aayog, outsourced seven assignments worth Rs 17.43 crore between 2019-’21 for evaluation of centrally sponsored schemes.

The majority of projects were given to PwC as it bagged 92 contracts between April 2017 and June 22 for over Rs 156 crore.

Deloitte got 59 assignments worth over Rs 130.13 crore, The Indian Express reported. The price of four contracts secured by Deloitte was not provided by the government.

British consultancy firm Ernst & Young was given 87 contracts worth over Rs 88.05 crore. The amount for five of its assignments was not provided. KPMG got 66 contracts worth Rs 68.46 crore, with no data on amounts for five of them. American consultancy firm McKinsey was given three contracts for Rs 50.09 crore, the newspaper reported.

Last month, the Ministry of Finance sought details of consultants appointed by all ministries and departments, according to The Indian Express. The ministry said that the information is required for “meaningful discussion for allocation of Budget under the professional/office expenses/salary head”.

“We have no clear idea of the strength of professionals from outside,” an unidentified senior official in the finance ministry told The Indian Express. “There are some departments under which many hundred people work as consultants, and some of them are paid very high.”