Kasaragod: Kasaragod's Madhur grama panchayat, controlled by the BJP since its inception in 1979, is mired in corruption, with the opposition presenting evidence of financial irregularities in printing voters' lists, distributing drinking water, selling waste to a private company, and allocating houses under the LIFE Mission.

Feeling the heat, the BJP state leadership asked the panchayat president K Gopalakrishna, vice-president Smija Vinod, three standing committee chairpersons Radhakrishna Soorlu, Umesh Gatti and Yashoda S Naik to step down from their posts, according to party sources. The deadline to resign was on Monday, August 19. The defiance by the panchayat president Gopalakrishna has put the party in a spot.

Officially, BJP district president Ravisha Tantri Kuntar said that the issue of corruption, particularly the corruption in printing voters' lists, was discussed by the district committee before the Lok Sabha election and Gopalakrishna was given a clean chit. "But the district committee does not interfere in such matters and so we asked the panchayat committees to take a decision," Ravisha Tantri told Onmanorama.

BJP has two panchayat committees, East and West, in Madhur grama panchayat and sources said both committees asked Gopalakrishna to step down. The sources said the state committee too pitched in with the same demand. "But Gopalakrishna took a stance that he did not do wrong and threatened to resign from the panchayat board if he was forced to step down as president," said a party leader.

BJP enjoys brute majority in Madhur, the only grama panchayat in Kasaragod where it has not lost an election. But in the 2020 election, it got a mild shocker when the LDF won four seats and the UDF, three seats in the 20-member board.

With just three members, the UDF has been watching over the financial affairs of the panchayat like a hawk. "The BJP is having a free run because the LDF government is not taking action on the complaints we filed with evidence," said Harris Choori, chairman of the UDF's Madhur panchayat committee.

He said that the UDF will be taking out a protest march to the panchayat office on Friday, August 23, demanding the resignation of the president and his team for the respective posts.

Drinking water scam
In the summer of 2023, the grama panchayat tapped a private tanker company to distribute drinking water to houses facing a shortage of water. As per the agreement, the tanker trucks had to install GPS to track the distance they covered. "But the tankers submitted the bills by counting the distance in their odometers," said IUML panchayat member Mohammed Habeeb S. On top of the lapse, the panchayat gave the tanker owner Rs 1.16 lakh more than the expense incurred, said the UDF.

Based on the UDF's complaint, the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau searched the grama panchayat office on Saturday, August 17. According to sources, the VACB team found evidence of financial irregularities.

"Today, the tanker owner came to the panchayat office to return Rs 1.16 lakh but the officials did not accept the money because the Vigilance was already investigating the case," said Habeeb.

Voter list printing scam
In October 2023, the State Election Commission (SEC) put out an order to revise the voters' lists. Madhur panchayat downloaded the voters' list from the SEC's website and took prints of the voters' lists in Malayalam and Kannada versions for all registered political parties and shelled out Rs 8.09 lakh for it. "We were appalled by the bill because usually voters' list prints won't cost more than Rs 50,000 to Rs 60,000," said Harris Choori.

Madhur has 20 wards, each ward has around 1,200 voters. Each sheet (both sides) has 60 names. In effect, the panchayat needs only 20 sheets to cover one ward. One set of voters' lists for 20 wards would be around 400 sheets. If the panchayat took 20 sets of prints to be distributed to 20 political parties, the number of sheets required would be 8,000. The rate of photocopying one sheet (both sides) is Rs 4, so the panchayat would have to shell out only Rs 32,000. If the panchayat went for another 20 sets (Kannada), the cost would be only Rs 64,000, said Harris.

For comparison, Onmanorama contacted Mangalpady, a bigger grama panchayat with 22 wards and a population of 48,441 to know its expenses. The grama panchayat, where Kannada and Malayalam are the two major languages, said it incurred a total expense of Rs 1.60 lakh for taking the prints of the draft voters' lists which were distributed to all political parties, and Rs 1.02 lakh for the prints of the final voters list, which was not distributed to

In contrast, Madhur with a population of 41,463 people 20 wards spent Rs 8 lakh taking prints of voters' lists.

Based on a complaint filed by the UDF, the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau raided the panchayat office. "But to date, there is no further action on it," said UDF panchayat committee chairman Harris Choori.

When contacted, the Vigilance DySP said that his team had found irregularities in the preliminary investigation and sent a report to the VACB Director. "We are waiting for further directions," he said.

Harris alleged further directions were not coming because of the LDF's tacit understanding with the BJP.

Waste collection scam
In 2022, Madhur grama panchayat entered into an agreement with a Kannur-based private company to sell non-biodegradable waste collected by the Haritha Karma Sena, who are mostly Kudumbashree women collecting, segregating waste materials and rejects.

UDF leaders alleged. that the company paid a flat price of Rs 1.30 per kg of waste and rejects, irrespective of the material.

In contrast, Clean Kerala Company, a government of Kerala company, rates ranged from Rs 5.90 per kg to Rs 50 per kg. "After our protests and march to the panchayat office, the company was dropped and for the past three to four months Clean Kerala Company has been picking up the waste," said Habeeb.

UDF filed a complaint with VACB and the Directorate of Panchayat. "A team of officials led by the panchayat joint director visited the panchayat office and took documents related to the complaint. But there has been no further action," he said.

LIFE Mission
UDF leaders alleged that Madhur Grama Panchayat favoured a few in allocating houses under the LIFE Mission by sabotaging the priority list. "We are in the process of collecting the documents so we have not yet filed a complaint with the VACB," said Habeeb.

"But the highlight in all the complaints we filed with documentary evidence is that the government does nothing," he said.

Meanwhile, a senior state BJP leader confirmed that the party's district president did ask the panchayat president to step down after widespread complaints. "He should not have taken such a decision if he didn't know how to implement it," said the BJP leader.

Panchayat president K Gopalakrishna's phone remained out of network area throughout the day and vice-president Smija Vinod said she was hospitalised and not in a position to talk.