SHILLONG, June 28: In a major development, the state government has removed Arunkumar Kembhavi from the post of Chairman-cum-Managing Director of Meghalaya Energy Corporation Limited (MeECL) and appointed Additional Chief Secretary, RV Suchiang in his place.
The government has also constituted an “independent commission” to probe the charges of corruption and other irregularities in the corporation.
The notification on the appointment of Suchiang was issued on Monday. The government also appointed Manjunath C. as the Secretary, Power department, replacing incumbent Pravin Bakshi.
Chief Minister, Conrad K Sangma said the MeECL will face a difficult financial situation in the next eight to nine months and hence, the government wanted an experienced person to lead the corporation. According to his estimates, the corporation is likely to suffer a loss of Rs 900 crore in the current financial year.
Commenting on the new CMD, the chief minister said he was hopeful that there would be good coordination between MeECL and the Finance department as Suchiang has the experience of looking after the Finance department.
“We are not judging the outgoing chairman. It is a tough situation and hence a tough decision was taken,” he added.
Asked if the change would augur well for the debt-ridden MeECL, Sangma said it might not show immediately results because the situation was complicated.
It may be mentioned that there has been widespread demand for Kembhavi’s removal from MeECL after issues of rampant corruption and power theft came to the fore earlier this year.
Speaking about the members of the probe panel, the CM said, “To ensure that the inquiry commission is completely independent, we wanted to avoid people who have links with the MeECL or the Power department.”
Details of the commission, including its members, will be notified on Tuesday, Sangma added.
The inquiry will be headed by a retired judge and there will be two other members – a retired government officer and a technical person.
The terms of reference will include different kinds of tenders floated by the MeECL for Central as well as state schemes. The commission will also look into different kinds of manpower issues such as appointment and other irregularities within human resources.
The panel, which will look into the work done in the last 10 years since the inception of the MeECL, will get three months’ time to submit its report. The allegations of corruption pertain to Saubhagya Scheme, power theft in Byrnihat Industrial area and other irregularities.
