Thiruvananthapuram: The Chief Minister and other ministers in the Cabinet waste no opportunity to say that Kerala is facing a financial strain. However, the same persons are involved in milking the government finances when it suits them.
Pinarayi Vijayan recently appointed a liaison officer at his office with a monthly income that amounts to around Rs. 1 lakh, which includes his telephone and internet charges and also Rs. 14,000 to buy books and magazines.
The job goes to Adv. A. Velapan Nair, a senior advocate, to oversee government cases at the High Court. This posting is when the government already enjoys the services of Advocate General and his subordinate advocates.
BJP leader K. Surendran has come down heavily against the Chief Minister’s wastage of public money. He made fun of Pinarayi’s decision by saying that the jobless Velappan Nair has got a job with a huge monthly salary.
Surendran also told mockingly to give jobs to other jobless people at the AKG center of CPI(M). He also questioned the rational of spending Rs. 14000 on books and magazines by asking what publications will Velappan Nair read by spending such a huge money.
He added that Velappan Nair should buy a ‘Ngana Pana’ and read it to the Chief Minister.
Earlier, Pinarayi Vijayan appointed K. Sampath, who lost the election to Lok Sabha, to liaison with the Central government and other states. He was given Cabinet rank which comes with salary, office, staff and other perks. This appointment was criticized from many quarters and political experts say that Sampath’s role is ambiguous and is totally unnecessary.
Kerala which is facing another deluge is financially strained to the limits. The communist government has taken huge amount of loans to tide over the situation. The government also released Masala Bonds to garner Rs. 2,500 crores from international investors with by offering high interest rates.
