THE GREAT DAMAGER Story of a KLAC Manager who excelled in manipulations

Firoz.T.Totanawala

The Bangalore Metro Reporter

15th july 2010 issue 

                                 THE GREAT DAMAGER

                 Story of a KLAC Manager who excelled in manipulations

India is a Nation of scams and more importantly it is also famous for non punishment to the accused. But the common Indian has no idea about the blatant corruption that takes place in the Government run organizations. And if any one does come to know about the corrupt undertakings and happenings, it will drive him nuts for sure.

Let us ask a few common questions to ourselves and see what the answers should be. 

What will an organisation, either a Government or a private one do if any of its officials is accused of:-

(a) Executing sub standard and bogus works?

(b) Claiming excess bills and bogus ones?

(c)  Purchases more materials than necessary?

(d) Held guilty by the Lokayukta?

Of course any one with a common sense would say that that official must be sacked and penalized and recovery proceedings should be undertaken against him for indulging in misappropriations while holding a responsible public post.

Unfortunately, not in the case of Mr. S.V.Venkatesh Murthy, an official of Karnataka Land Army Corporation. There has been no action taken against the said official and astonishingly, on the contrary, the official was granted promotion after promotion. Currently, an exclusive post of General Manager has been temporarily created to accommodate this corrupt official Mr. S.V.Venkatesh Murthy.

It should be noted that the Government had earlier approved the creation of two General Manager Posts on temporary basis and that too for a period of just one year. However, the KLAC is blatantly continuing with this arrangement even after the expiry of one year period. In fact, the KLAC has no fear to bother about the Government’s permission for continuation of temporary posts of General Managers because the Principal Secretary, Finance, M.R.Srinivasa Murthy is the godfather of S.V.Venkatesh. Mr. Venkatesh regularly browbeats the top brass in the name of M.R.Srinivasa.

MY CONNECTIONS EVERYWHERE-

As per records Mr. S.V.Venkatesh is a very fortunate man for he has successfully obtained high links at strategic place. When at first he made a mess of IRWS works during his durbar as DD in Dharwar, the then in charge CMD Mr. V.R. Gudi bailed him out.

Mr. Venkatesh had played havoc then. He indulged in sub standard works, bogus works, inflated bills, excess claims, purchase of materials far in excess of required quantity etc. etc. While Karnataka Land Army Corporation was sure to earn handsome profit out of this contract, it actually suffered losses due to manipulations by Mr. Venkatesh. In fact, Mr. Venkatesh had also executed works which were not even mentioned or approved.

Finally, the KLAC top brass, particularly Mr.V.R. Gudi and M.R.Srinivasa moved hell and earth to convince the entrusting agency to pay more service charges. Besides, they also convinced them to clear inflated and bogus bills after having known about the sub standard works.

DO HELL WITH THE LOKAYUKTA-

It should be noted that even the Lokayukta had conducted an enquiry into the charges of misappropriation against Mr.S.V.Venkatesh and others and had also held the charges as proved. The Lokayukta had directed the KLAC to initiate action against Mr. Venkatesh for misappropriation of several lakhs in purchase of steel etc. But Mr. V.R. Gudi, instead of taking action against him, freed him of all the charges which were held proved by the Lokayukta. Later Mr. Venkatesh was sent abroad for training.

But later Mr. V.R. Gudi was thrown out of KLAC, Mr. K.S.Manjunath became the MD and started operation clean up. Quite naturally, Mr. Venkatesh’s blunders also came under the scanner. Mr. Manjunath issued notice to Mr. Venkatesh to make good the ‘excess’ amount of more than four crores to KLAC or face the charges. Mr. Venkatesh got himself transferred and shockingly even Mr, Mr. Manjunath did not follow up the case later.

BACK TO SQUARE ONE-

Then, Mr. A.S. Srikanth, succeeded Mr. Manjunath. Mr. Srikanth was a total money minded man. Anybody could get anything by paying him the requisite money. Mr. Venkatesh once again seized the opportunity and was back to KLAC and quite obvious as it appears, Mr. Srikanth simply ignored the follow up actions to recover excess money from Mr. Venkatesh.

LUCK FAVOURS THE DONKEY-

Further to Mr. Venkatesh’s fortune, his godfather for all these years, Mr. M.R.Srinivasa Murthy became the BMP Commissioner. Mr. Murthy offered to entrust Footpath works worth more than 20 crores to KLAC but he put a condition that Mr. Venkatesh should be entrusted with the works. Mr. Srikanth of course agreed and Mr. Venkatesh was then promoted to the JD cadre and a separate BMP zone was created to accommodate him.

The BMP and later BBMP works executed by Mr. Venkatesh were all out and substandard. Of the total Footpath works more than 60% of the works were done by private contractors who got it as sub contract from Mr. Venkatesh and his team by paying them 30 to 35 percent commission. In fact, there was no need for laying concrete block footpaths after removing the cobble stone foot paths. The cobble stone foot paths have stood the test of the time and the BMP would have saved several crores if the renovations of footpaths were done by replacing the damaged stone slabs and relaying the existing slabs. But Mr. Srinivasa had a different plan. Later, 90 percent of the footpaths laid by KLAC have gone waste. Most of the cement curbstones and tiles have come off and the footpaths have already worn out. The BBMP was forced to lay many footpaths afresh, some with Sira stones or mosaic tiles. The BMP had also entrusted around 100 Hi tech toilets, at cost of more than 9 crores which also became non-functional in a span of two to three years.  

BAAP KA RAJ-

As long as Mr Srinivasa remained the BMP Commissioner, Mr. S.V.Venkatesh had a gala time. He used to draw advance from BMP as per his whims and fancies. There was nobody in BMP who could question the quality and quantum of works done by him as Mr. Srinivasa was his protector. In fact, even in cases of proven sub standard works, Mr. Srinivasa had made the payment.

There is still more in the book of the corrupt Mr. Venkatesh, but what is most hurting is that in spite of knowing about his manipulations he was never questioned rather he was promoted for his good. This explains the set up of cob web of corruption in our system. It is indeed a shame that people like Mr. Venkatesh move freely in the society and indulges in rampant corruption fearlessly under the protection of officials entrusted with the duty of public welfare. Shame…….