BENGALURU: Continuing its drive against those involved in the recruitment scam in 2011, the state cabinet on Friday decided to recommend to Governor Vajubhai Vala the prosecution of eight KPSC members, three of whom have already retired.
The cabinet recommended to Mr Vala to suspend five sitting members, prior to prosecution of all the eight members. Based on the recommendation of the cabinet, Mr Vala would write to President Pranab Mukherjee for prosecution of all these members, law and parliamentary affairs minister T.B. Jayachandra told the media here.
The retired members include Dr B.S. Krishnaprasad, Mr N Ramakrishna and Mr Kanhi Ram. The sitting members are Mr S.R. Rangamurthy, Mr N Mahadev, Dr H.V. Parthasarathi, Mr Dayashankar and Dr H.D. Patil, he said. Besides, the government has commenced the process of identifying those involved in the scam while occupying the position of secretary, KPSC. Their names too would be sent to the Governor for prosecution, he added.
When allegations were leveled against Mrs Mangala Sridhar, a KPSC member, she was suspended. When she challenged the government’s decision in the high court, the court upheld the decision of the government but said the decision for prosecution should be approved by the President. As all government communication to the President should go through the Governor, the cabinet recommended the prosecution to Mr Vala, he added.
Cabinet ignores Kasturirangan report on Western Ghats
The state cabinet on Friday accepted only two recommendations of the panel headed by Dr Kasturirangan—prohibition of mining and new thermal power plants—and rejected the others on protection of the Western Ghats by giving them the eco-sensitive tag.
Law and parliamentary affairs minister T.B. Jayachandra told the media the government decision would prove a major relief to people living in Western Ghats as they feared that the report would be implemented in to to. According to the report, many villages across 43 taluks of Western Ghats were likely to be given the eco-sensitive tag. The government deleted these villages from the list and included only wildlife sanctuaries and national parks along with those already declared as reserve forests. He said the government, however, would ban mining in Western Ghats, except sand mining, which would be regulated for use of local community but did not specify as to who would regulate it.
Besides, no thermal power plants would be permitted in the vicinity, but the cabinet decided not to ban hydro-electric projects nor accept the recommendation that construction areas should be regulated within 20,000 sq meters and for new townships with more than 50 hectares, the construction area over one lakh sq meters should be banned. Mr Jayachandra said the cabinet decided to withdraw the earlier notification and send a fresh notification to MoEF.
