Thiruvananthapuram: Congress Lok Sabha member TN Prathapan, who hails from Thrissur in Kerala, on Saturday expressed his displeasure over what he called blatant violation of protocols during the 74th Independence Day celebrations in the state.
Kerala has 14 districts, and the main Independence Day event is held in the state capital. In other 13 district headquarters, the general norm is that a state Cabinet Minister unfurls the tricolour and inspects the Guard of Honour.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and seven of his cabinet colleagues were forced to go into self-isolation on Friday after Malappuram District Collector tested positive for coronavirus. All of them had visited the site of the Air India Express crash site at the Kozhikode airport on August 7.
So, at four district headquarters, officials were the chief guests at the Independence Day parades.
"In my home district Thrissur, of the three state ministers, two are in isolation. The education minister and the government's chief whip, who holds the Cabinet status, was not asked to unfurl the tricolour. Instead, the District Collector was asked to do so. According to the protocol, even the state legislators and members of Parliament are placed above the state Chief Secretary. All sorts of violations take place in Kerala. I will now approach the President of India with a complaint about this blatant violation of protocols," said Prathapan.
The Malappuram collector, the assistant collector and 20 other employees of the Collectorate, who had actively taken part in the rescue operations at Karipur, had tested positive on Friday.
Seven ministers - E Chandrasekharan, K K Shailaja, K T Jaleel, E P Jayarajan, A C Moideen, V S Sunil Kumar, Kadannapally Ramachandran - Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan, Kerala Chief Secretary Dr.Vishwas Mehta IAS and DGP Loknath Behra, who were with the chief minister during his Karipur visit a day after the tragedy, were also asked to quarantine themselves.
(With IANS inputs)
