Govt transfers 36 Durga temple employees

Vijayawada: In a major reshuffle amid reports of rampant corruption at Durga temple in the city, the endowments departments transferred 36 employees on Thursday.
The transfers come just a day after raids were conducted by the vigilance and enforcement department at the temple on Wednesday.
The officials cited reasons like corruption, dereliction of duties and exceeding five years of service at the shrine for transfer of employees.
According to the orders issued by commissioner of endowments Y V Anuradha on Thursday, six employees in the engineering department including executive engineer and deputy engineer, eight assistant deputy executive officers, six superintendents, five senior assistants, nine junior assistants and three record assistants were transferred to various temples in the state. Also, five priests were transferred internally for their dereliction of duties.
According to sources, executive engineer Koteswara Rao, who was in the eye of storm for awarding engineering works tenders to certain contractors, was transferred to Simhachalam.
Deputy engineer Rama Devi was transferred to Tirupatamma temple at Penuganchiprolu in Krishna district. A few other engineers were transferred to Satya Deva shrine at Annavaram and other temples.
All the 36 transferred employees and officials were asked to report for duty within one week.
According to sources, executive officer Chandrasekhar Azad wrote to the endowments commissioner not to effect transfers before Krishna Pushkarams as employees who are not familiar with the city's topography would not be able to manage temple affairs properly during the river festival.
However, without considering his request Anuradha transferred all the erring employees.
"The list of new employees and officers transferred to Durga temple will be released soon. All 36 of them will have to report for duty by Monday," said a senior official of the endowments department.
Meanwhile, some employees hailed the transfers saying the decision will increase transparency in the temple administration apart from putting a check on hegemony of corrupt staff.