Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is known of getting frequent vigilance reports on the financial transactions of his ministers. With in few months of becoming Chief Minister, he had removed deputy chief minister T Rajaiah from the cabinet after receiving reports on his corrupt practices.
Now, he has reportedly suspended the discretionary powers of Excise and Prohibition Minister T Padma Rao Goud after receiving reports showing large amounts of bribes were collected for issuing bar licences using discretionary powers.
There are provisions in the act providing discretionary powers to the Excise minister to issue bar licences, to prevent loss of revenue if some problems arose in issuing bar licences. But, Chief Minister was said to be scared after receiving a vigilance report stating that bar licences are being issued liberally using these powers after getting an amount of Rs 30 to Rs 40 lakhs for each licence.
It was also revealed that an officer working from the minister’s peshi, who is a retired employee of the excise department has been monitoring the entire process and the minister blindly following his advises. He is practically running the show at the minister’s peshi. Even some officials in the department were also unhappy with the `unilateral’ attitude of this officer.
As provisions for bar licences are very hard, it is revealed that some MPs, MLAs and MLCs are succeeding in securing bar licences in their favour using minister’s discretionary powers. According to information till now such licences were issued to about 42 bars. This report makes the Chief Minister to suspend such discretionary powers of the minister, so that to ensure transparency in bar licencing system.
