Patnaik denies phone-tapping charges

Leading the charge against the government, Janata Dal (S) member Ashok Das alleged that telephones of several ministers — including Finance Minister Ramakrushna Patnaik and Works Minister Nalini Kanta Mahanty — and Opposition leaders were being tapped.

Das also accused the government of trying to cover up the Dara Singh cases, and questioned why the chargesheet had not been filed against Dara in the Arul Doss murder case. Besides, government advocates were also not attending courts when Dara’s cases were coming up for trial. Alleging that a file suggesting transfer of cases against Dara to outside Mayurbhanj and Keonjhar districts was pending with the Chief Minister for the past three months, Das said if this was not done, no witnesses would go to the court.

Patnaik refuted these allegations too and said the cases are being tried as per the rule of law. Fourteen cases were pending against Dara after his arrest in January — eight in Keonjhar district and six in Mayurbhanj district.

Das, however, also charged the state government with giving tacit support to the reconversion of 72 tribals at Manoharpur in Keonjhar district, and questioned what steps it had initiated against the person who reconverted them. It had now come to light that 28 of them did not swear any affidavit for reconversion to Hinduism.

The state recorded 26,702 cognizable offences during the last six months against the triennial average of 26,804.6, showing a decrease of 0.3 per cent. The crime rate in Orissa at 145.5 was lower than the all India average of 183.2, he said. Crime against women, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes had also gone down substantially, he added.

Patnaik said the state government had sought the assistance of the Centre to deal with Left extremism in the state. Two groups of Naxalites People’s War Group and the Nepal Maoist Centre are active in the southern districts of the state.

Stating that the government was keen to protect the Chilika lake, he said that a joint task force had been set up, taking members from the state government and the Indian Navy to prevent environmental degradation of the lake. Patnaik said a full-fledged Police Training Academy will be set up at Bhubaneswar. For this assistance of Rs 24 crore had been sought from the Centre. The commissionerate system of police for Bhubaneswar and Cuttack was also under the active consideration of the government.