Award function postponed as CM Devendra Fadnavis is busy

Mumbai: The award function of the state social justice ministry scheduled for January 2 has been postponed as chief minister Devendra Fadnavis has not yet signed the papers regarding the awards. Sources in the social justice ministry said that a new date would be announced after Mr Fadnavis clears the file. Minister of state for social justice Dilip Kamble said that due to the ongoing Parliament session, the dates of the awards have been postponed. According to him, the function will take place in January.

The social justice department of the Maharashtra government gives various awards every year. Awards like Samaj Bhushan, Dalit Mitra, Best Organisations Working for Dalit Cause are given every year. Generally these awards ceremony takes place on the first week of January and winners are selected by December first week.

This year also, file of these awards went for clearance to CM Fadnavis. Simultaneously, social justice department has started preparation of awards on January 2. But, according to sources, Mr Fadnavis didn't get time to clear the file. So now the function is postponed.

The minister overseeing the awards tried to clarify this mess saying, “We have just postponed the function as there is parliament session going on. The function will now take place in last week of January,” said Mr Kamble. On whether Mr Fadnavis has cleared the file, he said the chief minister had not signed the file yet as he is busy.