After failing to respond to the first notice issued by the Directorate of Civil Rights Enforcement in connection with the fake caste certificate case, officials issued a second notice to IPS officer M. Kempaiah (retd) on Tuesday .
Sources said Mr. Kempaiah had received the first notice and assured the officer that he would come. As he failed to appear, the officials pasted the second notice notice outside his house .
Director-General of DCRE Ravindranath said the notice is to give Mr. Kempaiah an opportunity to clarify the allegation against him. If he fails to turn up, officials will take a decision without his version, he said .
Refusing to elaborate further, Mr. Ravindranath said a file pertaining to the case, which was missing from DCRE, had been recovered. The matter is still in the enquiry stage and depending on the probe, action will be taken.
As per allegations, Mr. Kempaiah submitted a false caste certificate and got selected to IPS claiming that he is kadu Kuruba (backward caste), while he belongs to Kuruba (Schedule Tribe) community.
Mr. Kempaiah took VRS in 2009 and became the Home Minister’s adviser in the Siddaramaiah Government .
Since the case has once again came up for enquiry, Mr. Kempaiah is under the radar and if proven guilty, the Government may recover the salary and pension benefits he had claimed, besides filing an FIR, sources said.
Honnali MLA’s daughter’s case
Reacting to Honnali constituency MLA Renukacharya’s daughter’s case, Mr. Ravindranath said the DCRE has Initiated probe into the matter. The daughter of Mr. Renukacharya, who is from the Lingayat community, had obtained a certificate identifying her as belonging to Scheduled Caste. If the allegation is proven, the officials will book an FIR against her and charge the relative who gave declaration while obtaining the certificate and the Tahsildar who issued the certificate without following the rules, he said.
Briefing about the work done by DCRE so far, Mr. Ravindranath said the department has so far registered FIR against 111 tahsildars, 108 revenue inspectors, and 107 village accountants found guilty of issuing fake caste certificates . This apart, the officials have written to the department to initiate disciplinary action against 165 officials of the Revenue Department who failed to do due diligence while issuing caste certificates.
