Mandhu College's parent company Male' High Pvt Ltd submitted a case to court to receive an audit report that assessed damages to its business upon the Audit Office refusing to send the report to Male' High, with them winning the case.
Male' High is a company of former Parliament member Ibrahim Ismail (Ibra), with an audit being done by the audit office where losses to the company were assessed. When the report was sent to the Attorney General's office, the Audit Office spoke against giving the report to Male' High.
And so, charges were brought to the Civil Court against the Auditor General's office. However, the office did not file any response.
As per the Civil Court's sentence, the report is supposed to be handed over to Male' High as well, with it to be unchanged and given to the company within seven days.
The building was leased to Mandhu College during former President Mohamed Nasheed's government, with it being reclaimed during the PPM government in 2015 after it was claimed the building was not used to run an international school, as per the agreement.
Since then both High Court and Supreme Court have decided the annulment of the contract by the state was invalid. Male' High Pvt Ltd then claimed MVR 18 million as damages.
After receiving a letter from the Education Ministry on 23rd August 2020, the Audit Office prepared an assessment report detailing the losses faced by Male' High Pvt Ltd. However, Male' High had stated in court that they were unaware the Auditor General's office had released such a report and were not officially informed the report had been compiled.
The statement says that the only way the Auditor General can fairly assess the damages to the goods and business of the company is by consulting the company. It also said that the Audit Report, which was compiled without any documents, records or discussion from the company, has no validity, no weight and is a report to be revoked as it is against international auditing guidelines.
The Audit Office's report states that as the agreement where the plot where MES operated and an international school to operate had been voided, the highest amount in compensation could only be between MVR 1.2 million and MVR 1.5 million for losses incurred.
