DMK question: is there an Amma in your CV?

Also, after MDMK leader Gingee Ramachandran’s PS was caught in a cash-for-transfer scam in the NDA government’s finance ministry, the DMK wants to be sure about the people they hire. ‘‘It is important to check the antecedents of the people, especially those outside the government pool and detective agencies are the best as they do this job routinely for private companies,’’ said a senior DMK minister.

Sachit Kumar, director of Globe Detective Agency in Delhi, said: ‘‘We are a 45-year-old agency, we carry out pre-employment checks for private companies, MNCs and software companies. All I can say is that we have done such checks for government agencies and public sector banks, insurance companies and the like. But whether we are doing such an exercise for the DMK or not is something I can’t tell you because our clients are strictly confidential.’’ He added: ‘‘We have several branches and I don’t know which ones handle this. We employ 7,000 people and have no franchisees, so it is impossible to check.’’

When contacted, Union IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran said: ‘‘I am shocked you can even ask such irrelevant questions. I am not going to answer these questions and please don’t waste my time.’’

Says a staff member of a DMK minister: ‘‘Normally, it takes 45 days for any appointment to be cleared. Everybody’s private life and family ties are checked before any clearances are given.’’

Fourteen members are allowed as office staff for each MoS and 16 for a Cabinet minister. Each post is getting 20-30 applications. After the first round of sifting, half of these are discarded. The remaining have to go through a check by the detective agencies and if they approve, the names are sent to the Chennai high command. Here too, clearances are given after former Tamil Nadu-cadre IAS officer K A Nambiar, who was chief secretary during Karunanidhi’s tenure as a CM, goes through the list.