TANA funds being misappropriated, alleges former member

Vijayawada: There is no transparency in the administration of Telugu Association of North America (TANA), alleged former executive of TANA Anil Kumar Lingamaneni while addressing the media here on Friday.

Elaborating his allegations, he said only a small group of corporate heads is running the show at the cash-rich TANA which is flush with funds of $5 million in its kitty.

Anil Kumar recalled that he was elected to the TANA executive body by securing 7,000 as an independent candidate without the support of any panels. His membership of the TANA was cancelled when he started questioning the nefarious dealings of the TNA members and massive misappropriation of funds.

Though the bylaws of TANA clearly prohibits the persons with criminal record holding the positions in the organisation, there is a criminal case against joint secretary Ashok Kolla and H1 Visa tampering case against Treasurer Satish Vemuri.

Referring to the forthcoming elections to the TANA executive body which would be held most likely in the first week of March, Anil Kumar said that the powers-that-be in TANA changed the addresses of the 4,000 members to mislead them from participating in the elections.

They would not participate in the elections since the message did not reach them due to the change of their addresses. He wanted an enquiry into the misdeed of changing the addresses to bring the culprits to book.

Stating that it was virtually a war between the big corporate giants and the common members of TANA, he said that the common members were being silenced with the threat of defamation cases if they speak against the executive body.

Anil Kumar said that he too was served with a legal notice when he questioned the misappropriation of funds.

He deplored that any Indian dies in the US, funds are collected and nobody knows what happened to those funds. "There is no accountability and no transparency," he said.