VIJAYAWADA: Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) officials will now be reachable via Facebook and Twitter to react to people’s grievances. Chief Secretary of Andhra Pradesh Dinesh Kumar launched the Twitter and Facebook accounts of ACB on Thursday. ACB Director General RP Thakur sought people’s cooperation in tackling corruption through ‘@dgacbap’ on Twitter and ‘dgacb.ap’ on Facebook. Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Secretary appreciated the ACB’s initiative. He said: “Corruption is prevalent in our society, which is eating us like a termite. We are trying to make governance as transparent as possible. The state and central governments are zero tolerant towards corruption,” said Dinesh Kumar.
He said after linking Aadhar to various schemes, beneficiaries numbers had gradually dwindled. The state’s top official gave the instance of school education’s ‘Mid Day Meal’ scheme, where beneficiaries number had drastically come down to eight lakh students with the effective linkage of the unique identification number. He also admitted that several government officials had returned the money after receipt of complaint on a toll-free number. The Chief Secretary opined that corruption was related to the risk factor. “We have to make corruption very risky in order to bring it down. Society should help in eradicating corruption,” he pointed out.
Thakur said: “Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu has directed us not to spare any black sheep. If corruption goes down, the State’s development and happiness index would rise.” A special ACB court at Rajahmundry would start the proceedings in one month, he added. The ACB Director General cautioned that if any person is involved in corruption at any level, it will be difficult to get away with it. He elucidated that ACB was implementing ‘PPP method’, which denotes corruption-prone Place, Process, and Person. “The department will conduct a survey before performing any operation according to these parameters,” said Thakur.
He also stated that they are making a grid with other departments. The ACB has collaborated with Income Tax and CBI to deal with cases of corruption.