Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik defended the tours of CMO officials and came down heavily on the opponents in the state Legislative Assembly Monday.
Naveen said that CM Grievance Cell was closed due to COVID-19 restrictions for almost two years.
“Two years of Covid disruption caused dislocation in grievance redressal and I thought of reaching out to the people, by taking the CM Grievance Cell to the doorsteps of the people to cover all blocks and urban local bodies of the state in the shortest period possible. CM Grievance Cell is handled by the CMO and as per my directions officers from the CMO conducted decentralised grievances cell in all the districts of the state”, the Chief Minister said.
Naveen further informed that the exercise was carried out in more than 190 locations over a period of six months. Every day three to five venues were covered and in the process, 57,442 petitions were collected from the people, and as on date 43,536 petitions have been resolved or disposed off.
“I would say with all conviction that this is one of the biggest and most effective peoples’ grievance redressal exercises carried out by any Government in the country”, the five-time Chief Minister stated.
On the matter of bureaucratic supremacy and subjugation of political executives in Odisha, the BJD supremo slammed his opponents by saying, “CM Grievance Cell is always handled by CMO and Hon’ble Ministers are not required to attend the same in Bhubaneswar. Once petitions are received, they are sent to concerned departments. Where is the issue of Honourable ministers versus officers in this?”
“Hon’ble ministers have played a major role as heads of the departments in resolving the petitions”, the Chief Minister informed.
Responding to the political fuss regarding the excessive expenditure by the CMO officials, Naveen said, “If all these 57000 petitioners ( most are community petitions) had to come to Bhubaneswar to attend CM Grievance Cell how much money they would have had to spend in travel and stay, how much wage loss they would have had ??? All this has been saved by the CM Grievance Cell travelling to the doorsteps of people.”
Naveen also responded to the much-debated use of choppers by CMO officials. He stated, “I would like to clarify that it would have taken one and half years to do the same exercise by Road vis a vis by chopper. In the past six months when chopper was used intensively to reach out to the people, the average expenditure was around Rupees 1 to 1.5 crore per month which is similar to the average expenditure in the past three and half years. It’s completely false and misleading to say that excess expenditure has been made.”
The Chief Minister came down heavily on opponents of CM Grievance Cell.
CM Naveen concluded his assembly speech by saying, “Opposition members should be happy that so many grievances in their areas have also been resolved. I do not understand how someone can oppose the solving of people’s grievances. Such opposition is anti-people and people will give them a befitting reply for such attitude.”
PNN