Madras HC pulls up officials of TN Civil Supplies Corporation

Madurai, Sept 5: The

High Court bench here on Thursday pulled up the officials of the Tamil Nadu Civil

Corporation for delaying quality tests and cheating the

.

Justice N Kirubakaran said the officials were cheating the government using loop holes in the system and directed the food and cooperative department secretary to crack his whip on such corrupt staff and file an Action Taken Report.

The Judge was allowing a petition by Thavakkal Batcha, a TNCSC authorised hulling agent in Thanjavur, who delivered 337 tonnes of processed rice to Civil Supplies godown at Orathanadu on June 7. The TNCSC officials sent the samples for testing after three days and found the consignment contained old rice and was low in moisture and musty smell.

The officials issued show cause notice to Batcha asking why he should not be black listed after which he moved the court seeking to quash the show cause notice, citing that as per rules the officials must send the rice samples within 24 hours for testing. "It is a subversive pattern," the Judge said, adding "It is a classic case where the TNCSC officials had done disservice to the administration by defrauding the corporation and the public."

The 24-hour time limitation had been fixed for sending the samples for analysis so that accurate results could be obtained. The Judge pointed out that a lot of similar cases had been filed during the course of one month.

"So we suspect the motive of the quality control inspectors, who deliberately send the samples for testing. The officials cannot plead ignorance about the usual procedures with the kind of work they dealt with daily." The secretary should crackdown on such officials who indulged in malpractices and submit an action taken report in six months, the judge said.

PTI