Coonoor Municipal Commissioner Held for Graft

Ooty: The municipal administration in the Nilgiris once again entered the ‘hall of shame’ as the Commissioner of Coonoor municipality, near here, and his assistant were arrested by the officials of the department of vigilance and anti-corruption (DVAC) on graft charges.

Sources said Ramesh, hailing from Kotagiri limits, who took necessary permission from DTCP to demolish and reconstruct his old building in Kotagiri, approached Ilamparithi, the Commissioner of Coonoor municipality, also in-charge of the recently-created Kotagiri municipality, for the approval of building plan as prescribed under the Hill Stations Building Rules (HSBR) to start construction.

However, Ilamparithi is said to have demanded Rs. 5 lakh to accord sanction to the building plan and wanted Rs. 2 lakh in advance to allow him to go ahead with the construction.

Not willing to cough up the amount, Ramesh lodged a complaint with the DVAC.

On Tuesday evening, after sunset, Ramesh went to Ilamparithi’s camp office at Coonoor to hand over the money.

Vignesh, a junior assistant at Coonoor municipality, received Rs. 2 lakh in cash and took it inside the house and handed it over to Ilamparithi.

The DVAC officials, hiding nearby, entered Ilamparithi’s house, held an enquiry, seized the money and arrested Ilamparithi and Vignesh by Tuesday midnight on charges of taking a bribe.

G. Janardhanan, president of the Ooty Town Public Awareness Association, pointing to the arrest of a commissioner in Ooty municipality in late 2024 and action taken against four other commissioners who served in Ooty municipality in the past on charges of disproportionate wealth case, said though the HSBR was brought in 1993 in the Nilgiris to restrict and regulate mushrooming of concrete structures to save the hill ecology, over the years, the local body heads used it as a tool to mint money.

“It was good the DVAC arrested Coonoor municipal commissioner Ilamparithi against whom corruption charges were looming in recent times. At the same time, the DVAC should deepen its investigation to bring to the fore whether the graft taken by the local body officials reaches the higher officials in the Nilgiris who are members of the district-level Architectural, Aesthetics Aspects (AAA) committee and the officials of the Hill Area Conservation Authority who accord the

final sanction to commercial building plans in the Nilgiris. Corruption is more in the building plan sanctions aspects in the recent past. Many buildings have sprouted in the 30-degree steep slopes, violating the high court order that banned construction in the steep slopes and upon the top of the hills. We will write to the DVAC to look into this mega corruption as we suspect many higher officials dealing with building sanction are involved in it to accord sanction to commercial buildings in the Nilgiris,” Janardhanan added.

Sources said Coonoor municipal commissioner Ilamparithi initially demanded Rs. 6 lakh as bribe and settled for Rs. 5 lakh after giving what is called s ‘Pongal-related discount” of Rs. 1 lakh.