TRIFED – A hotbed of controversies

The Tribal Cooperative Marketing Federation of India TRIFED MD Mr Bala Prasad who was earlier suspended and later reinstated has gone on a long leave, informed sources say.

The poor IFS official who is in the rank of Additional Secretary had to bear the wrath of the Tribal Minister Jual Oram in the aftermath of Carnival organized recently at the Indira Gandhi Indoor stadium in Delhi which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Source say the MD refused to sign the bill of expenses the Chairman said he incurred during the carnival festival. The event which was planned to accommodate 10 thousand persons witnessed the crush that turned all arrangements put in place topsy-turvy.

Kiran Patel a tribal leader from Gujarat and the Chairman of TRIFED came along with 3000 of his supporters; as the arrangements for their stay and food was not there he got them settled privately. Later he wanted to claim the expenses incurred which MD refused to endorse, add sources.

Prasad wanted to have all the details of the guests who had come-their names, address etc which irked both the Chairman and the Minister, he said. On the ground of poor management of the event, the IFS officer was suspended later, sources add.

In fact, several tribal MPs and MLAs thronged the Stadium with their supporters also partly because the Prime Minister was going to inaugurate the Carnival-a cultural event displaying the mosaic of tribal culture from across the states.

TRIFED, which was ill-prepared to welcome so many guests fared poorly and the same evening at around 10 pm the Ministry decided to suspend the MD Mr Bala Prasad.

Later, since Prasad has also friends in the PMO he narrated his version of the story and his suspension was revoked. But given his not-so-easy equation with the Minister he has gone on a long leave. This has led to speculation if DOPT has begun search for his replacement at the behest of the Minister, who would also be too happy to have him removed, say sources.

TRIFED is registered under the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act and is under the Administrative control of the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Govt. of India. Its main objective is to serve the interests of its members in more than one State for the social and economic betterment of its members by conducting its affairs in professional, democratic and autonomous manner through self help and mutual cooperation for undertaking marketing development of the tribal products, claims its website.