Just months ahead of the assembly elections, an alleged Rs 800-crore job recruitment scam has placed the M.K. Stalin government in Tamil Nadu on the defensive, with the opposition AIADMK and the BJP demanding an investigation.
Citing a recent Enforcement Directorate (ED) report, the two parties have alleged large-scale “irregularities” in the recruitment process in the Municipal Administration and Water Supply (MAWS) Department.
AIADMK chief Edappadi K. Palaniswami launched a sharp attack on the government, accusing it of shattering the dreams of thousands of honest and hardworking youths who aspired to secure government employment through merit.
He said bribes ranging from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 35 lakh per candidate were collected by intermediaries acting on behalf of senior politicians and officials.
Palaniswami also accused MAWS Minister K.N. Nehru of converting the recruitment process into a money-minting operation.
“The job racket, orchestrated by Minister K.N. Nehru, his relatives, and select department officials, has converted the sacred process of public recruitment into a money-minting operation,” he charged.
Former BJP state president K. Annamalai, too, took a broadside, saying the DMK government had crushed the dreams of thousands of deserving candidates who could not afford the bribe.
"Out of 1.12 lakh candidates who applied for 2,538 posts in early 2024, thousands of deserving young people who had studied hard and prepared diligently were denied opportunities because they couldn’t afford the Rs 35 lakh bribe. The DMK government crushed their dreams & aspirations under the weight of its insatiable greed," he said.
Annamalai alleged that the latest revelation of the Rs 888 crore scam is not an isolated incident but part of a "disturbing pattern of systematic corruption that has become the hallmark of Stalin’s governance”.
Why ED seeks police FIR
The opposition’s tirade against the government came after the Enforcement Directorate alleged that as many as 2,500 candidates were selected by the state government through the recruitment process, where bribes amounting to Rs 25-35 lakh per candidate were collected by the accused.
The ED has reportedly shared several pieces of "evidence" like documents, photos and WhatsApp chats gathered by it to the Tamil Nadu director general of police (DGP) and also sought the registration of an FIR by the state police.
Under Section 66 (disclosure of information) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the ED shares evidence with a primary probe agency like the police to get an FIR registered so that it can take cognisance of the predicate offence (registered by the police) to file a money laundering case.
The ED found this evidence while conducting searches in a separate bank fraud case, a probe first initiated by the CBI, in April.
Nehru denies charges
Minister K.N. Nehru, meanwhile, rejected the ED charges, asserting that the process was conducted in a completely transparent and fair manner. He said the examinations were conducted by Anna University, one of the world's leading autonomous universities.
"It is well known that Anna University is among the foremost autonomous universities globally and functions independently — it is neither directly nor indirectly under the control of the Municipal Administration Department," the minister said in a statement.