Kochi, Kollam: Kerala State Cashew Development Corporat-ion (KSCDC) which swears by the welfare of the employees ahead of commercial viability, however, has been working for the benefit of suppliers and buyers, according to the agencies that investigated the wrongdoing at the public sector company.
The report by the finance secretary in 2014 found irregularities in the sale of processed cashew. According to the report, the corporation incurred losses of Rs 450, Rs 500 and Rs 300 per tin (each weighing 11.320 kg) for three categories of the product when compared with the prices fixed by Capex, a cooperative institution, for the same varieties.
The corporation sells approximately 2000 tins of cashew a day, making the loss to be around Rs 10 lakh. The report recommended immediate ouster of the managing director saying that he had been working for the benefit of private cashew owners.
Reports of the Comptroller and Auditor-General from 2008 have pointed out the gross irregularities in the purchase of the raw cashew nuts, the raw material. In the 2014 report, it said though the corporation was required to follow transparent procedures in the procurement of the raw material, “90 per cent of the raw cashew purchased was from a single company, JMJ, a private firm.” It also reported tender violations and failure in maintaining the quality of product claimed during the tender procedures. An agreement existed with the state trading corporation for the purchase of raw cashew at that time, but the corporation chose to deal with JMJ, resulting huge losses, it said.
The expert committee headed by industries principal secretary P.H. Kurian in its report in May 2015 noted that the corporation construed the ‘freedom with responsibility’ granted by the government as freedom to purchase and sell without following any commercially prudent norms and ‘responsibility’ as providing maximum number of working days without consideration of efficiency, productivity, or financial prudence.
