CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has refused to order a CBI probe into the implementation of the entrepreneurship scheme for conservancy workers in Greater Chennai Corporation. However, it has issued a set of directions to ensure only eligible workers and their legal heirs benefit from the scheme.
A division bench of justices GR Swaminathan and V Lakshminarayanan on Tuesday passed the orders on a public interest litigation petition filed by YouTuber Savukku Shankar alleging misappropriation of funds in the Annal Ambedkar Business Champion Scheme.
It said that since the issues highlighted by the petitioner have been redressed on account of the fair concession made by Ravikumar Narra, of Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DICCI), and the non-adversarial stand taken by the respondent authorities of the government, there is no need to direct the CBI to register a case on his complaint.
This laudable objective would be defeated if the majority of the list does not contain sanitary workers/legal heirs of deceased sanitary workers, the bench said.
The directions included rechecking of the 213 contractors and verification by the Chennai Metro Water Supply and Sewerage Board (CMWSSB) on the eligibility criteria for bidding for each one of them. The list will have to be revised and the entire process revisited if it is found that the list of beneficiaries does not effectuate the government’s intention.
DICCI will play the mentor role and handhold each and every contractor so that they alone constitute the body of shareholders in the group management company as well as the governing body, the bench said in the order. It stressed that the monetary fruits of the project will go only to the sanitary workers and the legal heirs of the deceased workers who were awarded the contract.