Chhattisgarh Government directly bought Corona testing kits from South Korean company at Rs. 337 per kit. Now, questions are being asked where was the need for AP Government to give procurement contract to a third party company. Even in that case, the contract was given to Sandor Medicaids of which one of the directors is Kasiralla Venkata Muralidhar Reddy who is business partner of a Minister’s brother in Kurnool district.
Now, to cover up the scam, the AP Government has written to Sandor expressing its anger over differential costs of kits supplied to Chhattisgarh and AP. Actually, YSRCP Government has been boasting from the beginning that it has bought Korean kits directly. From CM to Ministers, everybody spoke a lot about how the kits were brought in a special flight to AP. But, as per the contract, it is clear that Sandor is supposed to have brought kits. At the time of launch of the kits, neither CM nor Health Minister talked about involvement of Sandor in procurement process.
One tweet by Chhattisgarh Minister on kit price has triggered the whole controversy. Otherwise, it would have died a natural death. Anyhow, social media went wild asking hundreds of questions on CM Jagan’s claims of transparency. Initially, Government threatened to file cases saying that it bought kits at Rs. 700 but some launched malicious campaign saying cost was Rs. 1,200. Later, Special Chief Secretary Jawahar Reddy clarified that the cost was just Rs. 640. Again, a copy of government’s order to Sandor came out. It put kit price at Rs. 730.
Obviously, Jagan Regime is now under a never before pressure to prove that there were no attempts to loot Rs 36 Cr public money in Corona kits.
Babu 363 cr.