Alleging that the District Collector was acting against the ruling party, four MLAs of the All India NR Congress, including Government Whip G. Nehru, conducted a dharna inside the Collector’s office here on Tuesday alleging red-tapism on the issue of granting pattas to landless persons.
Led by Mr. Nehru, M.Vaithianathan, Parliamentary Secretary to Chief Minister, P.M.L. Kalyanasundaram, former minister and P. Karthikeyan marched into the Collector’s office campus in Saram and staged a dharna at the entrance for while. They accused the District Collector of acting in favour of Opposition MLAs while ignoring the ruling party MLAs’ proposals for welfare of public.
Mr. Nehru told The Hindu that the officials had not taken any action on the applications recommended by the ruling party MLAs to obtain pattas for landless persons. Revenue officials such as Tahsildar and Revenue Inspector who were working creditably, have been shifted without reason. “Such frequent transfers hamper the patta distribution to landless and survey work,” Mr. Nehru said.
He added that the District Collector and other officers in the Survey Department were passing the buck on the patta transfer files.
They said that after the All India NR Congress took over, MLAs had submitted several recommendations to the Land Survey Department for granting free pattas to landless people. Several representations had been sent on behalf of people in Orleanpet, Lawspet, Kalapet and Ossudu. MLAs alleged that there was no action taken by the officials on their recommendations.
“If the situation warrants so, we may come with public and conduct a mass agitation here’’, added Mr. Nehru.
