DIMAPUR, DECEMBER 29 (MExN): The Against Corruption and Unabated Taxation (ACAUT) Nagaland today stated that “there is nothing in the PDS Order Act 2001 or the Food Security Act 2013 conferring upon the state government the authority to repackage PDS items.” The ACAUT said this in response to the Nagaland Chief Minister’s recent statement on the alleged PDS rice scam.
“The ACAUT Nagaland is gratified that the Chief Minister TR Zeliang chose to justify himself and his department on the PDS scam expose of December 9. The ACAUT has nothing to say except to add that since the CM has publicly admitted that indeed repackaging of PDS rice took place under the directive of his department, that he would be liable for prosecution before the appropriate authority when the time comes,” it stated.
The ACAUT said it would “fool no one for the F&CS department to issue a backdated order (4th November), hurriedly drafted after December 9 authorizing the stockiest to repackage rice in white synthetic bags.”
It further alleged that the CM’s statement “directly shields Vinay Kumar Sethi a.k.a. Tinku, PDS accused,” who it informed was a suspect in the killing of late Sailesh Sethi in 1997 as per a police Chargesheet Case No. 70/97 U/S 115/120/302/34 IPC, filed by West Police station.
The ACAUT lamented that despite being a suspect in a murder case, the accused “still continues to be the most powerful man in Nagaland till this day.” “For 19 years, this man, instead of being locked up in jail, has been courted by successive Chief Ministers which is most shameful and demeaning to the office of the Chief Minister and an insult to all right thinking Nagas,” the ACAUT said.
It demanded that the case against Vinay Kumar Sethi a.k.a. Tinku be reopened by the Dimapur police.
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