The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Friday accused a Congress MLA of adopting fraudulent means to misappropriate government money.
BJP State unit president V. Saminathan has alleged that N. Dhanavelou, Congress MLA and Chairman of Puducherry Agro Products, Food and Civil Supplies Corporation Limited (Papsco), had submitted fake petrol bills for his official car.
Information gathered through the Right to Information Act showed the that the MLA had produced bills to show that he had filled 137 litres of petrol for his sports utility vehicle at a time, Mr. Saminathan told the media. He had produced bills for filling 137 litres of petrol on every alternate days in December last year, he added.
Mr. Swaminathan sought to know from the MLA how he could fill so much quantity when the capacity of SUV’s fuel tank was only 55 litres. The petrol was filled from Papsco-owned outlet itself, he added. Terming it as a serious case of misappropriation, he said the amount spent was ₹1.38 lakh.
The party would lodge a complaint with the Chief Secretary against the official who cleared the bill without ascertaining the facts, he added. The case of fake bill was not an isolated incident, he said and added that in the days to come more such issues would come to light.
He pointed to the extravagant manner in which two Ministers had spent money to renovate their official residences.
At a time when Union Territory was facing severe financial crunch, the Ministers had spent around ₹40 lakh for renovating their residences.
Modi to address meeting
The party workers are enthused to welcome Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Puducherry on February 24. He would be addressing a public meeting at Lawspet Helipad Grounds around 2 p.m. The party had deployed around 500 workers to mobilise people for the public meeting, he added.
