The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Panchayat Raj body denies role in train accident

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 04, 2005

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Panchayat Raj body denies role in train accident

Special Correspondent

`District officials and the Railways are to blame'

HYDERABAD: The Andhra Pradesh Panchayat Raj Services Association has condemned the statement issued by the Andhra Pradesh Revenue Services Association (APRSA) that lack of Village Administrative Officers in Nalgonda district led to the train accident near Valigonda.

In a statement issued here on Thursday, association chairman S. Anil Kumar and secretary-general T.M.B. Butchi Raju accused the district administration of failing to alert the Railways in time after heavy rain.

Blame game

They said that the entire blame should be borne by the district administration and railway authorities. They said that the accident was the result of total failure of mandal executive magistrates, irrigation officials and the Railways.

They said that there were 1,178 panchayat secretaries, 327 former VAOs, 301 surplus staff and 105 VDOs of the Revenue Department when compared to only 19 executive officers of former Gram Panchayat services in Nalgonda district.

They pointed out that district-level monitoring was done during the tenure of previous Nalgonda Collector R.P. Sisodia by the staff of revenue, irrigation and panchayat raj engineers besides mandal and gram panchayat staff.

Monitoring done

Using wireless sets, hourly monitoring was done as a chain of tanks was connected to Nagarjunasagar canals, the leaders noted.

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