PANAJI: Minister for Water Resources Department Vinod Paliecar paid surprise visit to the WRD office at Porvorim on Tuesday at 3.30 pm.
During his visit, Paliecar found that four staff members were sleeping during the office hours and four officials absent without a prior permission of the section head.
Following an order from the Minister, executive engineer Pramod Badami issued show cause notices to the four officials including junior engineers Vasant Madkaikar and Shailesh Phaldesai, lower division clerk Martinho Fernandes and work assistant Harsha Kambli, asking them to file their replies by March 24.
Paliecar, while speaking to media, said that in order to bring discipline in the administration, he has started inspecting the offices of his department, and added that when he visited the Porvorim office, he found that four staff members of the data entry section were sleeping and some were absent without a prior permission.
“I have already instructed the concerned in-charge of the office to take action against such staff members. I will not tolerate indiscipline in my department,” he said, adding he will continue this exercise of visiting the offices of his department.
Meanwhile, stating that he has decided to review all the development works carried out in the last 5 years by the department and that the exercise will be carried out at every taluka office, the Minister said that he will constitute inquiry committee if irregularities are found in the works carried out by the earlier minister.
“I will visit the WRD taluka offices every 15 days and review the works carried out during last 5 years. If I find irregularities in the works, inquiry will be conducted by a special committee and action will be initiated against the guilty as per law,” he told this daily.
He further informed that the work along the southern bank of the Chapora river at Siolim was carried out without conducting environmental impact assessment study by the WRD and added that he was told by officials that the department has already spent around Rs 6 crore on the work, which is a waste of public money.
Going against the expert committee findings that it was not feasible to construct a jetty at the river bank, the department has carried out the work, he added
“Though the National Green Tribunal has stopped the work, public money has already been wasted on that work” he said, maintaining that he will conduct inquiry into that particular project.
