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Congress targets Minister for pension scam

Staff Correspondent

Report indicting Kailash Vijayvargiya put in cold storage, says party spokesperson

BHOPAL: Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee general secretary and spokesman Manak Agrawal has targeted the State Minister for Public Works Department, Kailash Vijayvargiya, for the alleged bungling in distribution of social security pension by the Indore Municipal Corporation during his tenure as Mayor-in-Council between 1998 and 2004.

At a press conference here on Wednesday, Mr. Agrawal said the Indore Commissioner had indicted Mr. Vijayvargiya in his inquiry report which has been submitted to the State Government.

Besides being the Mayor-in-Council between 1998-2004, Mr. Vaijayvargiya is the BJP MLA from Indore and a senior State Minister since 1993, he said, adding that he had relinquished the Indore Mayor's post only after his own nominee had been elected as Mayor in 2004.

Mr. Agrawal said that the report by the Indore Commissioner points out that of the Rs. 33 crores disbursed as social security pension, Rs. 16.5 crores were distributed among those who were ineligible for receiving the pension.

He said it was unfortunate that despite objections raised by the Election Commission, the State Government and the District Collector, the Mayor-in-Council chose to continue the disbursement of pension to those who were ineligible.

The Congress spokesman told journalists that the Divisional Commissioner's report stated that of the 56,358 beneficiaries, the pension forms of 36,869 were missing.

Besides 50,707 beneficiaries were receiving pension from cooperative banks or cooperative societies and only 5,214 pensioners were getting their pension from banks, he said, adding that under the prevailing rules, the pension was to be disbursed only through the post office or the nationalised banks.

The practice of distributing pension through cooperative societies and banks was started on orders of the Mayor-in-council, the Congress spokesperson alleged.

Mr. Agrawal said the State Government had put the Indore Commissioner's report in cold storage and efforts were on to sweep the issue under carpet.

He urged the State Government to seek a CBI probe into the pension scam and said if the State Government failed to act, the Centre should intervene and order a CBI probe since 50 per cent of the funds for social security pension came from the Centre.

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Congress targets Minister for pension scam

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