Times of India: Bangalore:
Thursday, October 03, 2013.
Governor HR
Bhardwaj may have come to the gubernatorial office with the distinction of
having the second longest tenure in the Union law ministry after Ashoke Kumar
Sen, but his legal adviser MR Hegde draws a higher salary than him today.
Documents
with TOI reveal that Hegde's gross monthly salary is Rs 1,43,843, which is Rs
33,843 more than Bhardwaj's Rs 1.1 lakh.
A senior IAS
officer sees no problem with this as Hegde is an adviser and his salary can
exceed that of the governor. People in service, he said, quoting the
Constitution, cannot be paid more than Bhardwaj. But documents obtained through
the RTI Act reveal that bosses drawing lesser salary than their subordinates is
quite common in Raj Bhavan.
BS Ramaprasad
(governor's secretary) draws a gross monthly salary of Rs 1,31,880, which is
again Rs 21,880 more than that of Bhardwaj.
The
documents, given in June 26, 2013, have details of expenditure incurred since
Bhardwaj took over (June 29, 2009) till this June.
All 18
sweepers including a head sweeper, draw a salary of Rs 2,56,929 every month.
Sweeper Ragamma draws the highest monthly salary of Rs 21,748, Rs 1,469 more
than head sweeper Shivanna G.
The 23-strong
kitchen staff draws Rs 3,83,881 per month as salaries. While Govindraj R, a
buttler, draws the highest salary at Rs 27,586, more than the head cook,
Devendran C S, who receives Rs 24,458.
The head
cook's salary is closely followed by that of Masalachis. Masalachis in Raj
Bhavan draw a total salary of Rs 67,626, with the highest drawn by Kumar N at
Rs 23,902. The term 'Masalachi' is extensively used in the Army, the National
Cadet Corps, Indian Railways, and other government departments. An Army officer
said: "A Masalachi is somebody who washes the dishes and does other
cleaning work in our mess/kitchen."
Further, Rs
43,14,719 has been spent on the governor's tour expenses with his petrol bills
adding up to Rs 1,60,70,063, more by Rs 1.17 crore. The maximum amount spent on
tours was in 2012-13 (Rs 14,29,708) when his fuel bills totalled Rs 72,25,354.
However, in 2013-14 (up to January 6, 2013) the petrol bill was Rs 2,54,196,
while tour expenses were Rs 4,17,710.
.JPG)
.JPG)
