More skeletons are tumbling out of the cupboards of Andhra Pradesh Economic Development Board constituted during the regime of former Telugu Desam Party government headed by N Chandrababu Naidu, as the present YSR Congress party government has ordered a probe into the largescale irregularities into it.
The APEDB was headed by Indian Revenue Service officer Jasti Krishna Kishore, against whom the Jagan government ordered an ACB inquiry following complaints of irregularities.
Though the government suspended him pending inquiry, he got it suspended by approaching central administrative tribunal.
During the investigations, it was revealed that out of 19 members on the APEDB who were appointed as consultants, senior consultants and young professionals, 12 members belonged to Kamma community.
Most of them were either directly connected to Krishna Kishore or recommended by other IAS officers close to Naidu.
Some of them were recommended by Naidu and others by Krishna Kishore directly. All these members of the EDB had drawn salaries of not less than Rs 2 lakh per month, sources said.
For example, consultant D V Mallikarjuna Rao was a friend and a classmate of Krishna Kishore; senior consultant Nimmagadda Saranya is the daughter of State Election Commissioner Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar; another consultant Neha Ratakonda is the daughter-in-law of owner of Profit Shoe Company in Vijayawada and she was referred again by Krishna Kishore.
Young professional S Jeevanmani was appointed on reference from Vanishree, a government official and relative of NTR family. Similarly, another consultant Nanduri Divya is closely related to Krishna Kishore.
The ACB authorities are probing into these appointments and their job profiles to find out whether there were any irregularities involved in it.
