Sundergarh: In another instance of assault on bureaucrat by politicians, a case was registered against Congress MLA from Sundergarh Jogesh Singh for allegedly making death threats to the Block Development Officer (BDO) of Tangarapali.
The victim identified as Soumendra Kumar Das has lodged a complaint with Lefripara Police. As per the allegations, the MLA over phone demanded that all the projects under Gopabandhu Gramin Yojana should be allotted to his own people. However, after the BDO refused to take such illegal steps, the MLA allegedly verbally abused and made death threats.
On the other hand, the MLA refuted the allegations and counter alleged that the government official misbehaved with him.
“The MLA wanted me to allocate all the works to his own people. When I refused saying I cannot go against the law, he abused me and threatened to kill me,” said the BDO.
“These are all false allegations. There is no question of me giving him death threats. Why would I threaten a BDO? He in turn misbehaved with me saying he has seen many MLAs. I will be filing a defamation case against him,” said MLA, Jogesh Singh.
On the other hand Minister Damodar Rout came down hard on the attitude of bureaucrats, saying wherever there are discrepancies, the bureaucrats are responsible.
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“The bureaucrats and not the politicians are responsible for all the discrepancies. The people who have the courage can bring them into line. Late Biju Patnaik had suggested thrashing the bureaucrats in case they are not discharging their duties properly,” said Damodar Rout.
In reply to such remarks, the OAS association president, Saroj Samal said “We are public servants and we have to always discover ourselves in that role. We recommend our officials to correct themselves, in case of any deviances in our conduct at a personal level.
Recently, the Bolgarh tehsildar also lodged a complaint against ruling BJD’s Begunia MLA for assaulting her.