Digvijaya Singh’s Office Reduced to Digital Address in Bhopal, But Digital India is Not to be Thanked

Bhopal: Two-time Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh’s personal office has gone digital in Bhopal. However, the move has nothing to do with the ‘Digital India’ campaign.

The AICC general secretary vacated the bungalow allotted to him as CM, but the government is yet to respond to his letter for office space.

Singh has now moved his belongings at a bungalow in Rivera Town in Bhopal, which belongs to his close aide.

The people from the society have raised objections against running of office from a residential locality.

Singh’s Personal Secretary OP Sharma told News18, “Digvijaya Singh ji chose not to seek re-allotment of the bungalow as this would have set up a wrong moral precedent as the court had asked former CMs to move out of government bungalows and the ex-CM has always abided by the court orders.”

Incidentally, the MP government had re-allotted plush government accommodation to former CMs Kailash Joshi, Babulal Gaur and Uma Bharti taking refuge in various pleas in support of senior BJP party leaders.

Meanwhile, after moving out of the government bungalow, Congress Co-ordination committee chairman Digvijaya Singh’s staff did write to Chief Secretary BP Singh for allotment of office space on August 1 but is yet to receive an answer.

Presently, the staff of 14 has no place to sit and the office only has a digital address: [email protected].

The staff complained that lack of a physical office is causing inconvenience as there is no place to meet people.

Senior Congress leader KK Mishra accused Ajay Mehta, the office bearer of Rivera Town society, who opposed Singh’s office of being a close aide of CM Shivraj.

The MP government through an earlier legislation had made former CMs eligible for government accommodation and other perks but following a verdict from Supreme Court, the High Court had in June ordered MP government to get all government bungalows vacated within one month.

The Congress has accused the BJP government of bias in allocating government bungalows. “Nothing has been done for offering Digvijaya Singh ji office space despite him being a former CM and in possession of sizable staff,” Congress spokesperson Pankaj Chaturvedi said.

He further alleged that pleas for government accommodation from former Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia and Rajya Sabha MP Vivek Tankha too have fallen on deaf ears.