IAS officer’s wife wants husband suspended to save his life

The wife of a senior IAS officer in Karnataka has appealed to Governor Rameshwar Thakur to suspend her husband and save his life.

J N Jayashree, wife of IAS officer M N Vijaykumar, perceives a threat to the life of her husband, who is presently posted as Administrator of Command Area Development Authority (CADA) in the border district of Belgaum.

After her repeated requests to the state chief secretary Sudhakar Rao were rejected on the grounds that the election code of conduct did not permit transfers of Government officials after announcement of polls, Jayashree was forced to write to the Governor seeking her husband’s suspension.

“My husband’s life is in danger and he is changing locations thrice every week. There is a need to shift him to Bangalore immediately if his life is to be safe. Hence, I am forced to put forward such an extremely odd request”, Jayashree told reporters in Bangalore.

Jayashree said her husband’s life was in danger as he has been attempting to introduce transparency in the system and help fight corruption. “Though I had tried to meet the Chief Secretary and convey my anxiety to him, I was not given an appointment”, she said.

In her letter to the Governor, Jayashree claimed that her husband is the only IAS officer from India to find a place in the Transparency International website for courage shown to fight corruption. “Also, he is the only IAS officer from the country, whose name figures in the Wikepedia under world famous whistleblowers”, she added.

Jayashree revealed that her husband was one of the finalists to receive the Shanmugam Manjunath Trust Integrity Award given in memory of Manjunath, the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) officer, who was murdered on the line of duty. “He received the intimation to participate in the award function in New Delhi on March 28. Though he sought permission from the Government to participate in the function, the chief secretary told him that he cannot even attend the function, let alone participating in it”, Jayashree said.