Puducherry: Puducherry Lt Governor Kiran Bedi today dubbed as "administrative corruption" the "diversion" of staff for "unauthorised duties" and said the "theft" of services of personnel should be brought to an end.

In a whatsapp message to mediapersons here, the former IPS officer said, "Diversion of staff to unauthorised duties amounts to administrative corruption."

"This theft of services of personnel should be brought to an end as it is a serious and uncontrolled corruption causing loss of essential manpower to the concerned departments who are too junior to resist diversions," she said.

Her comments come in the wake of a media report on the government's reply to an RTI query, disclosing diversion of workers from Public Works department to the offices of the Ministers and MLAs in the Union Territory.

"There was diversion of staff including medical staff, teachers, police, electrical technicians, drivers, helpers, office staff and more," Bedi claimed.

Stressing on the need for mandated annual audit of personnel services in the government departments, she said every employee costs the exchequer. Bedi also rued that nobody answered for this "theft of services."

She sought to know whether this required a Public Interest Litigation, judicial intervention for all Heads of Departments to certify annually that their staff were on duty in the offices they are meant for and drawing salary from the offices.

The Congress government in Puducherry and Bedi have been at loggerheads over several issues, ranging from medical admissions to civic problems, for over a year.