Amid the controversy last month, Puja Khedkar, a former IAS trainee officer whose candidature was just terminated by the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC), attempted to clarify her stance in a letter to Maharashtra's Additional Chief Secretary.
Khedkar claimed that Pune collector Suhas Diwase had "subjected her to insults" since the first day of her training at the Pune District Collectorate in a letter dated July 11, three days after she was moved from Pune to Washim.
Puja had been transferred to Washim on July 8 as a result of her "arrogant behaviour." Diwase had complained about Khedkar's "entitled behaviour" in a letter to Additional Chief Secretary Nitin Gadre.
She mentioned in her letter that Diwase had complained to Gadre, and she claimed that his letter and the accompanying media coverage had caused her immense suffering.
“…Because of this (letter and media coverage) my image has became that of an arrogant officer in the public’s eye. This is causing me mental trauma and I am extremely disturbed,” she said in the three page letter written in Marathi.
“I don’t know the reason, but since the day I joined as probationary officer, the Pune Collector has been subjecting me to insults,” she said.
She also addressed claims in the letter that she had taken the additional collector's ante-chamber without permission. She mentioned that her lunch box had been dropped off at the Collectorate by her father, Dilip Khedkar.
In response to a complaint lodged by a tehsildar at the Pune Collectorate, Pune Police recently charged Dilip Khedkar with exerting excessive pressure on a public servant.
“Additional Collector Ajay More had voluntarily offered me his ante-chamber and had directed his staff to set it up for me. The staff enquired about my needs and arranged the stationery, etc. After District Collector Diwase sir returned to office a day later, someone informed him about my sitting arrangement in the ante-chamber of the additional collector. Perhaps he was angered by this, he summoned the tehsildar concerned and ordered to remove my furniture from the ante-chamber. When I spoke to him, he alleged that I had encroached the ante-chamber and he wouldn’t listen to any of my explanations,” Khedkar said in the letter.
She said that the next day she tried to meet Diwase but since he was busy, she texted him. “I apologised to him and told him that I would accept whatever decision he takes about my seating arrangement. I thought that the issue was over,” she said in the letter.
