NEW DELHI, SEPT 1:On May 13, The Indian Express ran an expose on how Air-India's board approved a dubious performance-linked-incentive (PLI) bonus scheme which cost it Rs 286 crore, and benefited top officials such as the airline's managing director. The MD's earnings more than tripled in certain months because of this. The scheme itself was dubious because base-line performance benchmarks were lowered, to show over-achievements and bonuses.After this expose, based on a report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India, the aviation ministry asked Air-India to stop the PLI scheme from July 1 for at least the government officials who are on deputation to the airline.Well, guess what? In identical representations sent to Air-India on July 5, the deputationists have said the ``orders are discriminatory since PLI was part of the terms and conditions of service which were applicable to the official on deputation.'' Those getting this largesse, and now feeling aggrieved include IPSofficial Ravi Kant Sharma who is Air-India's Director of Vigilance, IPS official R P Singh who is the Director of Security, IRS official A P Pawar who is the Advisor (Tax), and IPS official M B Sagar who is a vigilance official in the airline.A-I was forced to stop the payoffs after the government asked it to take action on the adverse audit which linked PLI to A-I's financial mess. Civil Aviation Secretary P V Jayakrishanan who also doubles up as chairman A-I cited the CAG audit and stopped PLI for officials on deputation. Air-India's managing director Michael Mascarenhas who received the representations, has passed the buck to the Civil Aviation Ministry which is now examining the representations. Mascarenhas, it is learnt, has pointed out that that PLI was actually being paid from the working capital loan for A-I.Consider what the officials have made from the PLI payoffs. R K Sharma joined A-I in April 1998. Sharma has received Rs 6.98 lakh from A-I as against Rs 2.50 lakh he would have drawn in hisparent organisation. According to the CAG report, his ``A-I emoluments were 279 per cent over what he would have earned in his parent cadre''. Sharma was also drawing kit maintenance allowance without having any kit to maintain as the report points out. As Director Vigilance Sharma drew Productivity Allowance of Rs 4,620, PLI of Rs 2,97,894, clothing allowance of Rs 800 apart from seven other special allowances.In the case of A P Pawar who has been working with A-I since March 1996 to date the CAG audit has found that A-I paid him what the CAG describes ``as a whopping 300 per cent - Rs 19.74 lakh whereas he would have earned only Rs 6.63 lakh in his parent grade''. Worse, the CAG audit has questioned Pawar's appointment since A-I had twice told the Aviation Ministry in (December 1994 & April 1995) that it did not want to fill up the post since A-I had appointed professional tax advisors. The CAG report says: ``A-I's submission to the Ministry seems to have been in vain... as they (Ministry) seems tohave forced the issue of appointing an IRS official''.Describing the PLI payoffs to Singh and Sagar which range from 184 per cent to 200 per cent over what they would have drawn in their parent department the audit report says that: ``By paying them disproportionately higher emoluments than what they would have got in their parent cadre and post A-I violated prudential regulations of the government with irregular payments''.Besides, the officials currently on deputation in the airlines, other IPS and IAS officials have earlier drawn crores in PLI from A-I. These include former MD, IAS official Brijesh Kumar who as MD initiated the PLI payoffs.
