ACB searches at durga temple: More heads likely to roll

Vijayawada: The suspension of 16 employees and including six superintendents in Durga temple on Monday became a hot topic in the Durga temple. There are speculations that action will be taken against some more employees. But the officials are tight-lipped on it.

Though irregularities reported in nearly ten sections, the officials have taken action against employees working in some sections only on Monday. The Anti Corruption Bureau conducted searches for three days in the Durga temple atop Indrakeeladri and noticed many irregularities committed in the sarees section, engineering section, stores, tickets issuing section, prasadam tickets, sanitation etc and submitted a detailed report to the Endowments commissioner P Arjuna Rao.

The commissioner instructed for the suspension of 16 employees including six superintendents. Interestingly, no senior officer was suspended on Monday. The staff is wondered why only lower-level staff was suspended and no action was taken on the senior officers, who monitor and supervise the day-to-day administrative activities in the temple. The lower-level employees lamented that it is unfair to target them ignoring the senior officers.

The ACB submitted a detailed report after noticing the irregularities in some sections. The employees must wait for the decisions of the endowment department on taking action against some more staff. Irregularities were noticed in recycling of Darshanam tickets, sale of scrap and other administrative activities.