Kakinada, Oct 11th:  Four wardens of welfare hostels were suspended and showcase notices were issued to 75 others in East Godavari district after officials conducted a surprise inspection in 165 welfare hostels. District collector Mr.Gopalakrishna Dwivedi had directed on last Thursday all revenue divisional officers (RDO) to conduct surprise checks with tahsildars in the 165 selected welfare hostels in 60 mandals. All RDO’s conducted checks and identified those four wardens as not at all discharging their duty and 75 others were not doing their duties properly. The collector after examining the report, issued suspension orders to the four wardens. He also issued orders to cut one day’s salary to 52 wardens and sent showcase notices to other 23 other wardens.

The common fault was poor sanitation and poor diet to the students, besides not responding to the grievance of the inmates. In the girl’s hostel, the situation was worse with an added security problem. In an official release, the collector directed all hostel welfare officers not to allow repetition of this, respond to inmates’ grievances and ensure sanitary, mess and boarding arrangements and health of the inmates. He also suggested that inmates bring problems to his notice directly. The suspended hostel welfare officers are K.Venkateswara Rao, warden of the social welfare hostel at G.Mamidada, K.Usha caretaker of the social welfare residential school for girls at Ramanayyapeta in Kakinada, superintendent of the AP Residential hostel for girls at Jaggampeta, and Mary Ratnam, warden of the AP Residential hostel for girls at Anaparthy.