Lust for Sex Lands Karnataka’s Mass Education Director in Soup

From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore

Bangalore, Jan 6: Senior IAS officer of Karnataka cadre, D K Rangaswamy, who is now serving as the state’s Mass Education Director, has landed himself in trouble with the B S Yeddyurappa regime ordering a probe into the alleged complaints for seeking sexual favours from a young widow while serving as the Ramanagaram district deputy commissioner in 2007.

The state government has ordered a high level inquiry into the complaints of the lady, a resident of Rajarajeshwarinagar in the city, following disclosure of the details in a local newspaper after obtaining details under the Right to Information Act from Karnataka Lokayukta Justice Santhosh Hegde’s office.

The chief minister’s principal secretary I S N Prasad, who replaced V P Baligar in the wake of the battle of dissidents against Yeddyurappa waged by the Bellary Reddy brothers, disclosed the government’s decision of ordering a probe.

The state chief secretary S V Ranganath would be appointing a competent inquiry officer to conduct the probe against the alleged complaints lodged by the widow, R Yamini, against the senior IAS officer, for allegedly sought sexual favours from her, Prasad said.

The government’s action follows the publication of the report in a local leading daily and the chief minister B S Yeddyurappa’s announcement that stern action would be taken. ``The government would take a serious note of the issue and take suitable action against the official,’’ the chief minister had told reporters.

The alleged sexual harassment come to light following Lokayukta Justice Santosh Hegde’s revelation that the state government was shielding a top bureaucrat who had demanded sexual favours from a young widow when he was deputy commissioner of Bangalore Rural district.

Justice Hegde had recommended a departmental inquiry against Rangaswamy.

The Revenue Department, in its report, had said that the then Bangalore (Rural) Deputy Commissioner Rangaswamy and the woman’s husband ``jointly’’ did ``some land-related business.’’

Ms Yamini’s husband Sashi Kumar had died following a serious road accident.

The Revenue Department stated that as Deputy Commissioner, Rangaswamy abused his position in such a way that he converted a kharab (barren) land to cultivable land in 2007 granted it to her on payment of a meagre Rs 3 lakh per acre and without charging her the price of land, which was stated to be Rs 10 lakh per acre, thereby causing a loss of Rs 31.5 lakh to the government.

On October 16, 2007, Rangaswamy had issued notice asking the woman to pay Rs 31.5 lakh towards the value of 1.2 acres of land granted to her and hours later he stayed his own order by passing another order.

The woman then obtained a stay order from the High Court against the Deputy Commissioner’s order.

It was reported that Ms Yamini wanted some land, which were in her dead husband’s name to be transferred to her.

When she approached Mr Rangaswamy for the paper work, he had allegedly said that her husband had illegally occupied government land. He also allegedly made sexual overtures towards her.

According to the Revenue Department’s report, Ms Yamini had lodged a complaint that Rangaswamy was in the habit of regularly visiting her house and frequently contacting her on mobile and landline phones besides sending SMS messages, a few of which had been preserved. The report also mentions that Ms Yamini had produced evidence regarding Rangaswamy’s visit to Kollur Mookambika temple in coastal Dakshina Kannada district to perform puja for her husband, when he met with an accident.

JD(S) DEMANDS SUSPENSION OF ANOTHER IAS OFFICER FOR MISAPPROPRIATION OF FUNDS:

Meanwhile, JD(S) floor leader in the assembly and former minister H D Revanna, at a separate news conference, has demanded immediate suspension of another senior IAS officer, Rajiv Chawla, who was serving as Commissioner of Survey Settlement and Land Records, Rajiv Chawla for allegedly misappropriation of funds sanctioned for survey works in five cities.

Revanna alleged that Chawla had misappropriated the funds sanctioned for survey works of cities of Mangalore, Mysore, Hubli-Dharwad, Bellary and Shimoga on public private partnership model.

Though the survey work had been assigned to a Hyderabad based private company, the department headed by Chawla purchased equipment at an exhorbitant cost of Rs 3 crore and handed it over to the company. The actual price of all equipments was Rs 1.5 crore,  Revanna claimed.

The cost of each GPS equipment was around Rs 12 lakh to Rs 13 lakh but the commissioner purchased 13 equipments by paying Rs 20 lakh to Rs 25 lakh each.

In order the spent Rs 8 crore sanctioned by the Centre before March 2010, the city survey work had been hurriedly commissioned by Chawla, Revanna contended.

The management of the Nemmadi Kendras, which were established to issue the Record of Rights, Crops and Tenancy Certificates (RTC) to farmers, had been given to Comet Technologies, which had Chawla’s wife as the partner.

The Nemmadi Kendras have been exploiting the farmers by charging exorbitant price to issue RTCs, he alleged.

The JD (S) also demanded suspension of the department’s Deputy Director Rudresh, for whom Chawla had given powers to handle all activities of the department by sidelining senior officials.

Revanna claimed that Chawla had also made an attempt to allot four acres of land to his wife at Kumbalgod village in Kengeri Hobli in Bangalore South taluk, which was later dropped.