Mumbai/Chennai, Aug 5 (IANS): The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has registered a case against three officials of the Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT), Pune, and two representative of bus maker Ashok Leyland for irregularities.

"Irregularities in the procedure for taking samples in connection with procurement of CNG buses of Ashok Leyland being purchased by the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) were found in this case," said a CBI official.

A CIRT official unofficially informed representatives of Ashok Leyland that the plywood samples submitted by them have failed the fire test. The DTC was totally unaware about the same, the CBI said.

"This gave Ashok Leyland the chance to manage fresh samples. They also marked the fresh samples with old sticker number by themselves, tested them as per specifications and sent fitness report by giving the reference of first samples and induced DTC to accept the same while the test report in question were forged," the official said.

The CIRT officials booked are: M.H. Bavardekar from technical directorate, scientist V.D. Chavan of auto lab-I, and head of engineering division-I D.N. Nande.

Representatives of Ashok Leyland A. Medhekar and V.P. Gautam have also been booked, the CBI said.

Meanwhile Ashok Leyland in a late night statement issued Wednesday in Chennai claimed: "The company would like to state categorically that all buses supplied by the company and plying with DTC fully conform to all quality requirements and are covered by valid certifications from the accredited laboratory as required and meet all safety norms fully."

"The company has received a query from CBI and is fully cooperating with them to provide all the details," the statement said.

On July 23, the company’s Managing Director R. Seshasayee told reporters: "Owing to an employee mistake the buses were delivered fitted with suspect material. Within 24 hours of coming to know of this we wrote to DTC asking their permission to take further samples from those buses for retesting."