Kadakola GP on wrong foot

Minister Ramdas pays surprise visit, unearths many irregularities

The minister, who was accompanied by zilla panchayat CEO G Sathyavathi issued instructions to suspend the GP secretary, Shyamala and bill collector Madappa, as per MLC Siddaraju’s directions.

Speaking to media persons after his surprise visit, Ramdas said that financial indiscipline ruled the roost at GP. Despite the arrival of the minister and ZP CEO, KGP secretary Shyamala had failed to turn up at the office.

Ramdas said that it was found that bill collectors were keeping collections up to the tune of Rs 25,000 in their pockets for more than a week and not remitting it to the bank.

When the minister and ZP CEO questioned bill collector Madappa as to why the money had not been remitted, the bill collector said that the attender had been sent to fetch challans. Later, it came to light that a bundle of challans were found at the office of the In-charge Panchayat Development Officer (PDO) Chikkaboregowda.

When the officials including PDO and bill collectors asked to produce various documents, they tried giving excuses and were hesitant to give out the documents.

Upon inspection, it was found that various registers and documents were found in the PDO’s office.

Ramdas said that several complaints about the ‘khata’ had been received by the PDO’s office but action was yet to be taken.

RTIs pending

Several applications filed under the Right to Information Act were found pending from February 2011, even though the PDO who acts as the Public Information Officer (PIO) has to give away information within one month.

Taking the PDO to task, Sathyavathi said that Rs 25,000 fine will be imposed on the former for failing to give away information.

Several grama panchayat members raised concerns about issuance of ‘khata’.
The list of beneficiaries under the Ashraya scheme in the year 1999-2000 was also missing from the KGP.

Citizens’ Charter, lack of acknowledgements to applicants and no maintenance of dairy by officials were also found.

Ramdas also mentioned that people were complaining regularly about lack of implementation of various projects.

He said that there was no transparency in the KGP. Sathyavathi instructed executive officer Mahalingappa to verify all the records and submit a report.