The much hyped AGM of Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Society (Iffco), which was to take the final call on cooperative’s decision to gift prime properties to its MD and Joint MD, went up in smoke on Thursday. The Annual general meeting (AGM) ratified the cooperative’s decision to gift prime public properties as incentives to Managing Director Uday Shankar Awasthi and Joint Managing Director Rakesh Kapoor as token of their services to Iffco.
Presided over by Iffco Chairman NP Patel, the AGM passed all the resolutions unanimously. However, sources told The Pioneer that the AGM ratification was just a formality as the Iffco Board members prevailed on the 1,000 odd members of the AGM.
Earlier, IFFCO chairman NP Patel successfully convinced the AGM members that the Iffco had taken legal opinion on the matter and there was nothing wrong in gifting houses to MD and JMD as incentives.
The minutes of the last AGM indicated that one of delegates had expressed his dissent against the transfer of ‘IFFCO Ghar’ located in posh Hauz Khas to the MD and a house in Vasant Vihar to the Joint MD. The member had cautioned the AGM that the said properties are the assets of IFFCO and transfer of these two properties will send a wrong signal to the smaller societies.
The Pioneer had first reported the controversial gift to IFFCO MD and Joint MD. Taking a stern view of the illegal transfer of public properties to Iffco MD and JMD, Deputy Commissioner (DC) of South West district Nikhil Kumar had written CVC and other senior Government officials about the brazen abuse of DoPT guidelines. After the media report, the CVC had started investigation in the matter.
Following the controversy, Awasthi and his deputy had offered to surrender the properties, worth `80-100 crore, to IFFCO.