Chief Minister Naveen Patanik made a whopping 61 helicopter trips to different places of the State on 41 different days between December 11, 2013 and March 5, a period of pre-election campaign, at an expenditure of Rs2.43 crore borne by the State exchequer.
This information was furnished by the State Government’s Parliamentary Affairs Department in response to a RTI query, said RTI activist Pradip Pradhan. Pradhan said the concerned PIO provided him info in two phases, on June 6 and on June 16.
The total expenditure made as hiring charges of helicopter/aircraft from December 10 to March 9 is Rs2.43 crore. While the expenditure incurred between December 10 and January 9 was Rs86.05 lakh, the expenditure for the periods of January 1 to February 9 and February 10 to March 9 stood at Rs72.86 lakh and Rs93.94 lakh respectively.
With this, the PIO has mentioned that the Deccan Charters Pvt ltd provides helicopter and aircrafts services to the State Government on fixed monthly charges fixed by the General Administration Department.The helicopters and aircrafts are being used by the Chief Minister, the Governor, the Ministers and the Central Government officials for official purposes. As such there is no earmark of expenditure for the use of helicopter/ aircraft of the Chief Minister.
On his reaction, Pradhan said neither the Governor nor any Central Government officials has made any visit to any place by using helicopter/aircraft during the period mentioned above. The Chief Minister made these visits as pre-election campaign for his own party (BJD) on public fund, Pradhan alleged.