Former vice-chairman of National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA) and TS BJP leader Marri Shashidhar Reddy has accused former Chief Secretary Somesh Kumar of having been ‘complicit’ in deleting 30 lakh voters illegally within the capital region within the GHMC region under the orders of Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao.
Stating that democracy will be the “biggest gainer” following the ouster of Mr. Somesh Kumar, the former MLA reminded that when the official was the GHMC Commissioner, he along with the then Chief Electoral Officer Bhanwarlal had devised a pilot project NERPAP- National electoral roll purification and authentication programme to link Aadhaar card with Voter ID approved by the Election Commission.
It was then that KCR had ordered for deletion of 15 lakh names in GHMC but Mr. Somesh Kumar under the garb of Aadhaar linkage straightaway identified 30 lakh voters for deletion and set the process in motion without serving notices as per law, he charged.
When this was brought to the notice of the EC, a 14-member committee was rushed to Hyderabad to enquire into the allegations and after detailed verification it was proved right and the official was held guilty of gross irregularities, claimed Mr. Reddy.
Mr. Somesh Kumar was transferred to the tribal welfare department as a face-saving measure although there have been instances where officials were placed under suspension for illegal deletions like in Uttar Pradesh but the official got away lightly under the patronage of the Chief Minister. Yet, the official was promoted as CS despite being allotted to AP cadre on the basis of an order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) and has throughout worked as an ‘agent of TRS’, alleged the BJP leader, in a press release.
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