THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan categorically refuting opposition UDF allegation that he had cleared the appointment of P.K. Sudheer as Kerala State Industrial Enterprises managing director, the vigilance will have to look into the entire sequence of events since it also involves the posting of an IAS officer. Sources said Pinarayi Vijayan in his capacity as the Chief Minister was also responsible for all establishment matters pertaining to all IAS officers. They said at the time of the appointment of Sudheer, senior IAS officer Dr M. Beena was holding the additional charge of the KSIE.
They say there is every possibility that since the appointment also involved divesting of additional charge of an IAS officer; Additional Chief Secretary (Industries) Paul Antony could have marked the file to CM for his perusal. Even if the said IAS officer was holding additional charge of the PSU, in the event of a change or divesting of the charge it has to be brought out as government order. In case if such a GO was issued then it would have also mentioned about the official replacing the IAS officer.
The statement issued by the former Minister on October 6 clearly mentioned that Sudheer’s appointment order was scrapped on October 3,2016 as the latter had demanded extension of joining period and the government could not accept that . The minister's statement also mentioned that orders had been issued for giving additional charge to Dr M. Beena. It may be recalled that Ms. Beena had been given the additional charge of KSIE after the then MD Saji Basheer was sacked by the government about four months ago.
It is in this context that the opposition is alleging that the file pertaining to the appointment of Sudheer came before the Chief Minister. However, Pinarayi has stated that PSUs have been constituted under the Companies Act and Articles of Association. The appointments to the PSUs come within the purview of the minister concerned and the files need not necessarily come to the Chief Minister.
A section of officials said that the vigilance would be looking into all these issues to fix responsibility. The chief secretary is also holding a parallel inquiry into the controversial appointments and these issues would be examined at his level as well.
