Clean-up staged with AI, fake attendance: Why two Gurgaon civic officials lost jobs

3 min readUpdated: Jul 2, 2026 03:01 PM IST

Before AI: A mound of garbage dumped near Gurgaon’s Kherki Daula Village. (Express Photo)

An official with the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG) was tasked with clearing a mound of garbage dumped near Gurgaon’s Kherki Daula Village following complaints from residents.

Soon, photographs of the area looking spick and span, with not a single plastic bag in sight, were uploaded to the grievance portal. Except that the area had never been cleaned. Officials said Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools were used to create a fake photo of a clean-up.

In a similar case, another official used GPS spoofing to fake his attendance.

Cracking down on technology-driven deception, the MCG on Wednesday terminated the services of the two officials, both Assistant Sanitary Inspectors.

Orders issued by MCG Commissioner Pradeep Dahiya outlined “grave misconduct, fraud, dishonesty” and behaviour deemed unbecoming of a person engaged in public service.

The first offender

According to complaint records accessed by The Indian Express, Assistant Sanitary Inspector Waseem was assigned to clear garbage on temple land at Kherki Daula Village.

Instead of executing the assigned work, he uploaded a fabricated ‘after’ image on April 7, which was manipulated to falsely show a completely clean, uniformly paved area.

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The order notes that Waseem “edited the original photographs through AI-based tools and uploaded such fabricated photographs on the official grievance portal with the intention of showing false compliance and obtaining closure of the complaint without carrying out the actual field work”.

The official admitted to the forgery during a personal hearing on July 1.

According to the official order, Waseem “deliberately uploaded AI-manipulated photographs on the grievance portal to falsely show that the complaint had been resolved, whereas the complaint remained unattended.”

The second case

In the second case, officials said Assistant Sanitary Inspector Sonu allegedly manipulated the civic body’s digital attendance system. Officials said a field inspection on April 9 found Sonu absent from his duty location, yet he was marked present on the MCG’s Sanitation Monitoring System Portal.

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When officials called his phone, he admitted he was at home.

Officials said an internal probe revealed that Sonu had been “using unauthorised third-party applications, including Fly GPS, to spoof his GPS location, thereby bypassing the security features of the official attendance application of the Municipal Corporation and fraudulently marking his attendance while remaining absent from duty”.

The termination order emphasises that he “intentionally created a false digital attendance record to mislead… authorities despite not discharging his official duties”.

Sonu admitted to using the spoofing application during a personal hearing.

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Following their respective hearings, authorities said the written explanations furnished by both employees were carefully examined and deemed “wholly unsatisfactory”.

The two men, both contractual employees deployed through the Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Nigam Limited (HKRNL), were relieved from their duties with immediate effect on July 1.

Noting that their continuation in service was “neither desirable nor in the interest of the Municipal Corporation, Gurugram,” the MCG has forwarded copies of the orders to the Chief Executive Officer of HKRNL with a formal request to officially terminate their deployment.

Abhimanyu Hazarika is a Senior Correspondent with The Indian Express, based in Gurgaon. He covers southern Haryana.

Education

- Post-Graduate Diploma in Print Media, Asian College of Journalism (Class of 2020)

- B.A. (Hons) Liberal Arts with a major in Political Science, Symbiosis School for Liberal Arts (Class of 2019)

Professional Experience

Before joining The Indian Express, he worked with Bar & Bench (legal journalism) and Frontline magazine, where he developed experience in court reporting, legal analysis, and long-form investigative features.

Reporting Interests

His work centres on civic accountability, environmental policy, urban infrastructure and culture, crime and law enforcement, and their intersections with politics and governance in and around Gurgaon.

Recent Coverage (2025)

- Crime: Reported on the recovery of 350 kg of explosives and an AK-47 from a rented house in Faridabad, linked to the 2025 Red Fort car explosion case (November 11, 2025).

- Environmental policy: Covered protests outside a Haryana minister’s residence against a Supreme Court order that environmentalists argue could allow mining and real estate development on large parts of the Aravalli hills (December 21, 2025).

- Pollution control measures: Co-authored coverage of the Rekha Gupta government’s enforcement of vehicle restrictions at Delhi-NCR borders (December 21, 2025).

- Road safety and infrastructure: Examined response lapses in the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway hit-and-run case and ongoing investigations into high-speed road crimes in Gurugram.

- Animal welfare policy: Reported on concerns regarding the low budget allocated for stray dog sterilization by the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (November 30, 2025).

- Urban culture: Featured the social media-driven popularity of a new Magnolia Bakery outlet in Gurugram (December 15, 2025).

Contact

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