Mescom MD involved in crores of rupee scam, charges ZP member

Zilla Panchayat Member M Thungappa Bangera on Wednesday accused the managing director of the Mangalore Electricity Supply Company (Mescom) Limited of being involved in irregularities worth several crores of rupees.

Thungappa of the BJP, who raised the issue during the general meeting of the Zilla Panchayat, said that rates of equipment like streetlights and transformers have been fixed at Rs 12-crore more than those of the government rate, according to the package tenders invited by Mescom.

Thungappa, without taking the name of the managing director charged the officer of being directly involved in the irregularities. He added that when he wanted to get information under the Right To Information (RTI) Act, Mescom officials sought his identity card (ID) to furnish the same.

Taking cognisance of the gravity of irregularities, the officer in question should be summoned to Panchayat meeting, he demanded.

Notice served

Following this, president Meenakshi Shanthigodu said that notice has been already sent to the Mescom MD to attend the meeting, as decided during the previous meeting. However, there is no reply yet from the officer, a Zilla Panchayat official later clarified.

The president also questioned an executive engineer of the Mescom at the meeting on why the MD had not attended the meeting in spite of being served notice.

The engineer, who claimed ignorance about any such notice, said that an executive engineer was supposed to attend the meeting, but not the MD.

Irked, Janardhana Gowda, another member from the BJP reminded that the Zilla Panchayat is vested with power to summon any officer by serving notice 15 days in prior.

Faulty bills

Another member Manjula Madhava Mave, from the Congress, accused the Mescom of issuing bills to Gram Panchayats according ‘at its whims and fancy’. Citing an example, Mave said, “At Kedila Gram Panchayat in Puttur taluk, the meter readers had charged Rs 95 lakh bill amount.
However, only after the panchayat development officer (PDO) and others cross-checked was the actual bill reduced to Rs 40 lakh. It is suffice to say that there is something fishy behind such faulty bills.”

Members M S Mohammed and Mamatha D S Gatti of the Congress demanded the authorities concerned to create a facility to display the number of units consumed and also the bill charged for the same at every Gram Panchayat offices.