Animal husbandry and fisheries minister Giriraj Singh at the BJP office during his janata darbar in Patna on Wednesday. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, April 13: When you go to a janata darbar to lodge a complaint, be sure against whom you are complaining. Else, a scolding may be waiting for you.

Despite their best intentions, government officials often fail to help the visitors to various janata darbars because they do not know against whom they want to complain.

Animal husbandry and fisheries department minister Giriraj Singh was disappointed today by a number of such complainants at his janata darbar at the BJP office on Beer Chand Patel Path. He was forced to ask them to come back with proper information.

Gaya resident Ram Naresh Paswan told Singh: “Sir, my file is pending in the collectorate. If you please call the superintendent of police (SP) he will convey the message to the district magistrate (DM).”

The minister was furious to hear such a request.

“How can the SP convey messages to the DM, who is a far senior officer? You have come here with a complaint but you do not know whom to contact. Until and unless you can explain your grievance to me, how can I convey it to the suitable authority?” said an irked Singh.

Then, he added: “This is a serious problem. A lot of visitors to the janata darbar come to lodge complaints. But they do not know whom to approach with their problems. If you tell me the name of the exact person, I will directly call him or her and sort out the problem. Otherwise I will keep calling different people and it will become tedious.”

When asked why this problem kept recurring, Singh said: “Actually the people are innocent. Most of them are unaware of the proper channel. They assume that visiting the janata darbar will solve their problems automatically.”

He added: “They must understand that every work is related to a particular department. A complainant today asked me to order a director in my department. But there are dozens of directors in my department. Whom will I order? I was puzzled about whom to contact.”

He also explained the embarrassing position that he finds himself in when trying to deal with such complaints.

“It sends a wrong message to the officials of my department. I just cannot call a junior officer and order him around,” said Singh. “A few days ago, a party worker requested me to talk to a police officer who seized his car. How can I tell a police officer to release a seized car? But I cannot ignore the person. I have some social responsibility,” he said.