Feeling alienated, SC IAS officer in Telangana quits

Senior IAS officer Akunuri Murali opted for voluntary retirement from service. Murali, a commissioner of the archives in Telangana government, has one year of service left before he applied for VRS, complaining about feeling alienated for being an officer belonging to Scheduled Castes.

Speaking to DH, the SC bureaucrat said that he put down his papers in protest. “There is discrimination in postings and the way a SC officer is treated.”

I am not singling out Telangana... discrimination towards officers from scheduled cases is everywhere but more in Telangana,” he said. What seems to have hurt Murali, known for being an upright officer, is the lack of work.

“In this assignment, there is no work. I was just drawing salary. I felt that quitting is better than continuing for one more year,” he said.

Murali, who really wanted to leave his mark in the education department, is known for his candid views among the SC organizations.

Murali’s career also has its share of controversies. He was dragged into minor storm for asking the tribal to eat beef and wild boar to be healthy just like their ancestors. He said this at the Eturunagaram forest area, while he was Bhupalpally collector.

He was reprimanded by higher authorities as that were the time a nationwide debate was going on beef-eating. Several Brahmin organizations also protested as he said that certain Brahminical values have been thrust upon Dalits who have beef and pork as their staple food.

Murali later apologized for having hurt the feelings of some sections.

Karthik Botla, a supporter who started an online campaign for Murali at the time, said that eating wild boar and hunting it is a common practice in forests of Telangana. The language used by him also is local.

“Do the Brahmins have sole authority on other castes? Stop victimizing a SC officer,” he pleaded.

This year Murali courted another controversy by using objectionable language while admonishing the mandal parishad (block) development officers during a video conference on individual sanitary latrines.