A writ petition has been filed in the Madras High Court challenging Tamil Nadu Lokayukta’s refusal to entertain a complaint against Cooperation Minister I. Periyasamy, Food and Civil Supplies Minister R. Sakkarapani, Cooperation Secretary Md. Nasimuddin and two other IAS officials for alleged corruption in the distribution of Pongal gift hampers to 2.15 crore ration cardholders on an outlay of ₹1,296.88 crore.
The petition has been listed for admission before Justice Anita Sumanth on Wednesday. K.R. Jayagopi, 52, a resident of Kuthambakkam in Tiruvallur district, filed the case urging the court to set aside an order passed by the Lokayukta on March 2 and issue a direction to the anti-corruption body to entertain the complaint and conduct a detailed inquiry after issuing notice to the Ministers and the bureaucrats.
In his affidavit, the litigant said the government had provided a hamper containing 21 commodities — including 1 kg of raw rice, 1 kg of jaggery, 1 kg of rava, 1 kg of wheat flour, 500 g of urad dal, 500 g of moong dal, 500 g of salt, 100 g of ghee, 100 g of turmeric powder, 100 g of chilli powder, 100 g of coriander powder, 100 g of mustard, 100 g of cumin, 50 g of pepper, 50 g of cashew, 50 g of dry grapes, 10 g of cardamom and one piece of sugarcane — to the ration cardholders in January this year.
Despite being a high-value tender, only a short e-tender notice was issued on November 17, 2021, for procuring the commodities from various vendors, and the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Transparency in Tenders Act, 1998, as well as the statutory rules framed under it were flouted, the petitioner alleged. He claimed that low quality commodities were purchased at exorbitant prices to swindle a huge amount of public money.
Stating that the government had spent ₹602 for every hamper, the petitioner contended that if the same products of better quality had been purchased in the open market, it would have cost the exchequer only ₹485 to ₹550 per hamper. He alleged that the public servants had swindled somewhere between ₹52 and ₹117 per hamper, which worked out to corruption to the tune of ₹111.80 crore to ₹251.55 crore.
“Even assuming that a bare minimum of ₹50 per beneficiary has been swindled, a minimum of ₹107.74 crore has been swindled by the public servants,” the affidavit read. He recalled that even Chief Minister M.K. Stalin had acknowledged complaints about the poor quality of products and ordered action against those involved in misdeeds.
Subsequently, a senior manager of the Tamil Nadu Civil Supplies Corporation was suspended. It was against this background that the petitioner had approached the Lokayukta for an inquiry. However, the anti-corruption body rejected his complaint on the ground that it could not interfere in commercial transactions. Assailing the rejection, he said his complaint was about corruption and not about any contract.
