Deccan Herald

Mangalore, Aug 31: The ‘protocol mania’ that has enveloped the DK Zilla Panchayat members for the past few months, seems to be never ending, which on Thursday went up to the extent of suspending a Block Education Officer (BEO).

The issue of not inviting the ZP members to the programmes being convened in their constituencies as per the protocol, has been swallowing major portion of the general meetings of the ZP. But they used to end up in resolutions to condemn such developments and officials’ promise that such things would not repeat.

But the protocol issue not only consumed the initial 50 minutes of the 8th general meeting of the zilla panchayat held here on Thursday, but also resulted in the suspension of Bantwal BEO K Sudhakar.

As the meeting commenced, ZP former president Mamatha D S Gatti rued that her name was missing in the invitation card prepared for the inauguration of Salettur High School and some other development projects in the presence of chief minister and deputy chief minister on August 27.

She said her name had been printed on the card prepared by the new high school, but was missing in the card prepared by the BEO’s office. Ms Gatti is the member elected from Salettur constituency to the DK ZP. She complained that the act was politically motivated and the BEO has purposefully left out her name.

At this juncture, Opposition members Shahul Hameed, Sundar Gowda, Chandrashekhar Kamath and others termed the development as a “dishonour to all the ZP members” and urged the Chief Executive Officer to take stringent action against the official. CEO A M Kunjappa said the BEO had justified that he had got the invitation card cleared from the DC’s office before printing.

He said action would be taken after getting a detailed report regarding this from the DDPI. BJP members Krishna Shetty, Tungappa Bangera, Venkat Dambekodi and others admitted that there was protocol violation, but requested the Opposition members to drop the issue for the time being and discuss the agenda. However, the Opposition members stuck on the issue and demanded for the suspension of the BEO.

They said though repeated resolutions are being made against the violation of protocol, the officials are neglecting their significance.

Owing to the mounting pressure, ZP President Sushma Janardhan asked the CEO to investigate into the issue, keeping the Bantwal BEO under suspension, thus cooling down the heated discussions.

Reacting on the issue of cancellation of the posts of district co-ordinators in Continuing Education, CEO A M Kunjappa assured the House that he would write to the government requesting the revival of the post in Dakshina Kannada.