Scania Falsified Truck Models, Bribed Minister to Get Contract in India

• State government-owned road transport corporation officials received as much as 65,000 euros ($77,300) in at least 19 cases.
• Scania had also falsified truck models by replacing chassis numbers and license plates on trucks to sell them to an Indian mining company. 

The Swedish truck and bus maker, a unit under Volkswagen AG’s commercial vehicle arm Traton SE, started operations in India in 2007 and established a manufacturing unit in 2011. 

An investigation started by Scania in 2017 showed serious shortcomings by employees including senior management, a Scania spokesman told Reuters when contacted for comment on the report.

“This misconduct included alleged bribery, bribery through business partners, and misrepresentation,” he said. 

He said Scania had since stopped selling city buses on the Indian market and the factory that was established there had been closed down. 

“We may have been a bit naive, but we really went for it... we really wanted to make it in India but underestimated the risks,” CEO Henrik Henriksson told SVT. 

Henriksson said any wrongdoing in India had been committed by a few individuals who had since left the company, and all involved business partners had their contracts canceled.

The bribes were also given to an unnamed Indian minister, according to the report by SVT, German broadcaster ZDF and India’s Confluence Media. An Indian government representative did not respond to requests for comment outside business hours. 

According to HT Auto, state government-owned road transport corporation officials received as much as 65,000 euros ($77,300) in at least 19 cases.

Scania had also falsified truck models by replacing chassis numbers and license plates on trucks in order to sell them to an Indian mining company in a deal worth close to 100 million Swedish crowns ($11.8 million), according to the report. 

The spokesman said its investigation of wrongdoing had not involved the police. 

“While the evidence is sufficient to prove breaches in compliance with Scania’s own business codes so that the company can take severe action accordingly, the evidence is not strong enough to lead to prosecution,” the spokesman said.

The article originally appeared in Reuters.