Udupi, February 3: The leaders of various Dalit organisations boycotted the Udupi taluk-level Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes grievances redress meeting here on Thursday.
“Although officers from 22 departments should have attended the meeting, only six had turned up for the meeting chaired by Udupi Tahsildar V. Prasanna,” DSS leader Ramesh Kotian told The Hindu .
“The Udupi City Municipal Council (CMC) Commissioner Gokuldas Nayak, Executive Officer of Udupi Taluk Panchayat and Block Education Officers of Udupi and Brahmavar, were prominent absentees. We had gone to the meeting with several questions to be posed to them,” he said.
Mr. Kotian said that there was corruption in the utilisation of funds allotted for the welfare of Dalits in all government departments and the Udupi CMC. None of the government officers were under the control of the Deputy Commissioner M.T. Reju.
The SC/ST grievances redress meeting was being held just for the namesake. “While the previous district in-charge Ministers held redress meetings with all seriousness, the incumbent district in-charge Minister V.S. Acharya is not showing any interest in holding such meetings,” Mr. Kotian said.
The DSS leaders had urged the district authorities to allow presspersons to attend the grievances redress meeting on Thursday.
But Mr. Prasanna did not give permission as per the instruction of the Deputy Commissioner.
Leaders of Dalit organisations such as Karunakar Master, Prashanth Thottam, Venkatesh Manipal, Vishwanath Petri, Sundar Kapettu, Krishnappa N., Rajesh Padubidri, and Vijaylakshmi were present at the meeting, Mr. Kotian said.
Mr. Prasanna said that only eight Dalit leaders attended the meeting. They wanted the presspersons to be allowed to the meeting. “But there is no Government circular in that respect.
There is no such tradition in any other districts. Officials of only four departments – education, health, police and agriculture — did not attend the meeting,” he said.
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