Soon after Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu taking Uttarakhand officials to task for cutting a sorry figure in implementing Swachchh Bharat Abhiyan (SBA) in the presence of Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat, an extra alert district magistrate of Haridwar Deepak Rawat has caught an officer defecating in the open and immediately slapped him with a penalty of Rs5000 on Saturday.
It is learnt that while the DM was walking in the collectorate premises at Roshnabad on Saturday a junior engineer of the Manglour municipality council Jagdish Prasad defecating at a public place caught his attention. He was quick to take action against the offender and announced that Rs5000 would be deducted from his salary and the sum would be deposited in the Government treasury. He also asked the executive officer of the municipality council to have the amount deducted from the offender’s salary and submit its report to the DM office. Taking a stern view of the matter, DM said that if the offender is paid his next salary sans the ordered deduction disciplinary action would be taken against the executive officer of the civic body. Not content with that, he even asked the treasury department to inform him whether the amount is deposited into the Government account or not.
Notably, Naidu had reprimanded the state officials for their apathy to the cause of the cleanliness drive a few days after the Union drinking water and sanitation Minister Narendra Singh Tomar had declared the rural areas of Uttarakhand as open defecation free with fanfare while the State Government vowed to make the urban areas so in no time.
“However, before the excitement over the ‘sterling feat’ had time to evaporate another Union Minister having admonished the State officials in the presence of the Chief Minister for failing to execute the project must have left the state government and its officials red faced. The DM seen in a pro-active mood to stamp out the menace of open defecation must be seen in this context,” says an observer.