Chief Secretary denies humiliating DMK delegation that called on him

Chief Secretary denies humiliating DMK delegation that called on him

15/05/2020, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,CHENNAI

Chief Secretary K. Shanmugam on Thursday denied that he had humiliated a delegation of DMK MPs led by T.R. Baalu when they met him in his office on Wednesday and said it was disheartening to hear such allegations when government officials were working round the clock to fight COVID-19.

Responding to accusations by Mr. Baalu after the meeting, Mr. Shanmugam in a statement said there was no truth in the claims made by him.

Mr. Shanmugam said that at no point did he humiliate the delegation and photographs published in a regional daily were proof that their claim of being treated without even minimum courtesy was not true.

The Chief Secretary said Mr. Baalu repeatedly insisted on him giving a time frame to take action on nearly one lakh representations received by the DMK under its “Ondrinaivom vaa” programme. “I told him that it was not possible to give a time frame as the government was working with minimal staff due to COVID-19 restrictions, but all the representations will be sent to the respective departments and action will definitely be taken.” He said Mr. Maran too insisted on a time frame for taking action on the representations. The Chief Secretary said Mr. Baalu then asked if he should inform his leader (M.K. Stalin) that a date by which the issues would be resolved could not be given.

“I told Mr. Baalu to inform him that the representations were received and action will be taken”.

To this, Mr. Baalu said that he would inform that action was not taken since there were not enough employees, Mr. Shanmugam said.

“At this point, I told them ‘this is the problem with you people. You do not understand our difficulties’ and asked them to inform whatever they wanted to”, he said and added that he had no intention to insult or humiliate them.

The Chief Secretary said he had sent all the representations to the Chief Minister’s Special Cell.

“I am an ordinary government employee. I am not a politician. I work with the responsibility that people’s problems have to be solved and that’s why I immediately ordered action to be taken on these representations,” Mr. Shanmugam said.