NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday said there was something “seriously wrong” with the Food Corporation of India where 370 departmental labourers were paid Rs 4.5 lakh a month, a salary that was much more than the President of India. “Labourers in FCI have an aggressive past. Officers have been murdered. There is a clique that is operating there and FCI has become a hen that lays golden eggs for them. The FCI is literally held to ransom by the labourers and their unions and there is something seriously wrong with it,” said a bench of Chief Justice T S Thakur and Justices A K Sikri and R Banumathi.The bench was referring to a report of the high level committee comprising experts, IIM graduates and economists, which said that the Rs 1800 crore salary bill for labourers in FCI was unacceptable. It pointed out that apart from these 370, there were other departmental labourers who earned a monthly average salary of Rs 80,000 and that in contrast, the contractual labourers doing the same job earned Rs 10,000 per month.Appearing for FCI, advocates Y P Rao and Vikas Singh Jangra told the court that the average cost per month per worker in the corporation was nearly Rs 80,000. The bench said: “They are just loading and unloading sacks of foodgrain. How are they getting paid so much when the contractual labour for the same job gets paid Rs 10,000. This means there must be many who must be subletting the work to contractual labourers and drawing salary without doing anything.”On the basis of a November 15, 2014 story in Times of India narrating these facts, the Bombay High Court had taken suo motu cognizance of the “loot” that was going on in FCI and passed several directions, which included: reducing the mindboggling incentive scheme prevalent in FCI; making the labourers job transferable, abolition of depots and abolish the system of departmental labourers in phases.The FCI Workers’ Union through Amit Sibal had challenged the HC order. Instead of getting any sympathy, the counsel met with a barrage of questions deriding the system of wages prevalent in FCI.CJI Thakur asked solicitor general Ranjit Kumar whether the government has taken any decision on the directions passed by the Bombay HC, which had given a month to act on its November 26 judgment. The SG told the court that he would get back with the government’s response in 10 days.The bench issued a warning: “IF you do not listen to the recommendations of the high-level committee appointed by you and set FCI right, we will appoint a very high-level committee headed by a Judge to do the needful. Grains are wasted in FCI for years because of lack of storage facility. Rampant corruption is ruining the corporation.”The committee report was a tale of abuse of government funds, inefficiency, and reluctance on the part of the authorities to act tough against vested interests. It said so-called “labour gangs” at FCI have flourished under a system where state funds are used to pay them eyebrow-raising wages, including allowances.In August 2014, 370 workers received more than Rs 4 lakh in wages, incentives, arrears and overtime allowance. Another 386 workers received between Rs 2 lakh and 2.50 lakh in the same month. More than 6,000 workers at the agency, responsible for procuring, storing and transporting foodgrains in the country, received Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh.Insiders at FCI and experts who have closely observed the functioning of the agency say the practice is well entrenched. Often, well paid loaders hire workers -- or what is known as 'proxy labour' -- for Rs 7,000-8,000 to do their work.