Cong Leader Gives Vegetables As 'Bribe' To Engineer To Finish Cuttack Road
In a novel anti-corruption protest, an Odisha Congress leader went to give a bagful of vegetables to an executive engineer as a bribe for the construction of a road in a Cuttack neighborhood.
Jayadev Lenka
Bhubaneswar on 04/07/2023
An innovative protest of Cuttack District Congress was held today at Prachi Division under Irrigation Department, Govt. of Odisha in Bhubaneswar. Under the leadership of Mr. Manas Choudhury, District Congress President Cuttack some local farmers and other localites reached the office of Prachi Division Superintending Engineer Pratap Chandra Choudhury and inquired about various problems related to canal road and canal near Khadeita Panchayat under Cuttack Sadar Block. The localites alleged that the officer was asking for bribe in the form of PC for the construction of that particular road, and they have failed after hundreds of attempts. The village people have feen facing serious communication problems in the rainy season due to the non-construction of the 400 mtr long distance.
The local residents mostly belong to BPL families, and disheartened after learning that the road could not be done without PC/bribes. After failing from all, they informed Mr. Manas Choudhury about their helplessness. Mr. Choudhury and the local residents of Khandeita Panchayat went to Prachi division office situated at Bhubaneswar, and protested in the official chamber of the Superintending Engineer Pratap Chandra Chaudhury in a unique & innovative way. Some farmers put a bag of vegetables on the table of the officer, as they have no money to pay the bribe to make the road. One farmer took off his pant, shirt, mobile etc. and offered to the engineer so as to make it up for any lacking against the vegetables.
The impact of the innovative protest was such that the engineer assured to complete the construction work within a week. It is noteworthy that Cuttack District Congress President Mr. Choudhury has always taken up public issues and protested about public problems in unique ways never adopted in history. Similar thing was repeated today with many young farmers protested in front of the wearing masks of Manas Choudhury, and holding placards read his name and designation. This was done intentionally because, the engineer had insulted the farmers saying, "I don't know who Manas Chaudhury is."
Manas Chaudhuri said “ I will never deter from raising my voice against the PC practice going on in this Government. I always try to be stand alone and do things differently from others. In my unique ways of protesting I spent less but earn great support from public”.
On 15 Sept 2022 an opposition corporator complained to Cuttack Mayor Mr. Subash Singh about his ward's development work, to which Mr. Singh replied that he did not have money to install bathroom doors in his government office. In this context, Mr. Choudhury reached the Cuttack Municipal Corporation and gave the Commissioner a pair of doors and Rs. 500 for fittings.
On 2 July 2018, while Mr. Choudhury was the President of Bhubaneswar District Congress, he poured water all over the office rooms and stairs with water pipes in order to protest against the flood situation on the highway near ISKCON Temple.
State NSUI President Yashir Nawaz, Manoj Raut, Prakash Mishra, Manoj Biswal, Ranjit Patra , Ajay Sahu, Sankuna Kanar, Pratap Singh and others also participated in the program.
