Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday took the Uttar Pradesh government by surprise when he appeared at the National Rural Health Mission office in Lucknow, seeking information under the Right to Information act.
This comes close on the heels of formal admission by the Mayawati government that large scale bungling in the execution of NRHM programme was also responsible for the murder of two successive district Chief Medical Officers in Lucknow.
Barely 24 hours earlier, UP Cabinet Secretary Shashank Shekhar Singh had announced a total revamp of the NRHM monitoring, which was to be now entrusted to the chief secretary. By the time the news broke out to the local media, Rahul had done his bit by getting an application moved under the RTI act.
Expressing concern over the murder of the two CMOs, he told mediapersons while emerging out of the NRHM office, "It is a serious matter that there was largescale pilferage in the centrally-funded NRHM. We have made an application under the RTI act to elicit detailed information on the manner of utilisation of the huge funds sent by the Centre."
Shortly thereafter, Rahul headed straight for the residence of slain CMO B P Singh, who was gunned down during his morning walk on April 2 after he started raising too many questions on the utilisation of NRHM funds.
"Rahul has assured us of his full support and has even agreed to go the extent of urging the state government to hand over the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation, in case the state police investigations were not satisfactory," Singh's lawyer brother I P Singh told mediapersons.
"His visit has been a great morale booster and considering that he is such a big national figure, our family feels the entire nation is with us," he added. Rahul also spoke to the slain CMO's wife and children. He flew back to New Delhi at around 4.30 pm.
Also read: RTI application on govt allocations under NRHM
RTI application on govt allocations under Janani Surksha Yojana
