In Jharkhand, corruption reigns supreme

• On March 7, 2003, Food Supply Inspector A. Kumar, was caught red-handed while accepting a bribe of Rs 5,000. He too was remanded to judicial custody.

GUPTA, Singh and Kumar are among 123 personnel of the Jharkhand government who were booked by the state Vigilance Department under a drive launchd on March 1, 2001, to check corruption.

However, since most of those arrested till date are Class II and III employees, there is no dearth of criticism about the drive. ‘‘The small fish is easy to net. But the big ones are rarely caught,’’ said Anirudh Singh, an ex-service man. Singh is not wrong if the complaints registered by the vigilance sleuths against Class I officers are any indication. Sample them:

• Shila Kiskoo Rapaj, IAS: The Vigilance sleuths had lodged a complaint alleging she had gobbled up ‘‘lakhs of rupees’’ meant for construction of a marketing complex in Koderma in 1995 when she was District Collector.

• Alok Goel, IAS: As Director of Social Welfare Department, he is alleged to have withdrawn Rs 1.30 lakh from the treasury fraudulently and of destroying the file related to it.

• Dr Pradeep Kumar, IAS: He is alleged to have been involved in financial irregularities related with utilisation of Rs 30 lakh meant for development in 2002.

• K.P. Mandal, IAS: He is alleged to have purchased cement worth Rs 60 lakh without following the requisite financial rules of the government in 1999.

• Sajal Chakravorty, IAS: He is alleged to have sanctioned Rs 10 lakh to the DFO, Chaibasa, for implementing afforestation plan of the government in 1995. But the money was allegedly misappropriated.

• Sudhir Prasad, IAS: He is alleged to have connived with the land mafia in transfer of government land to housing cooperative societies as Ranchi Deputy Comissioner in 1995.

The state has 90 odd officers against a strength of 130. Of them, atleast 12 IAS officers had complaints of corruption registered by the Vigilance Department before the bifurcation of Bihar. After the bifurcation of Bihar on November 15, 2000, the above cases were transferred to Jharkhand. But the remaining seven cases were retained by the Bihar Vigilance Department. These cases show that Jharkhand Chief Secretary A.K. Mishra along with half a dozen of his IAS colleagues — Bishnu Kumar, A.C. Ranjan, Chintu Naik, P.P. Sharma and A.K. Singh — faced corruption charges.

In fact, Singh who was heading the PWD department as its secretary was served with an arrest warrant for duping the Bihar State Financial Corporation of ‘‘crores of rupees’’. After he surrendered and his bail plea was rejected by the Patna District Court, he was sent to judicial custody in Beur jail.

At his first press conference, Jharkhand Chief Minister Arjun Munda had said that his government was committed to check corruption in the state. ‘‘Action will be taken,’’ he had said.

However, three months later, no ‘‘action’’ appeared to have been taken. When Additional DGP (Vigilance) B.D. Ram was contacted, he said: ‘‘We will look into those cases that were transferred to us.’’

Today, most of them are out on bail. And, all of them, of course barring those who have retired, grace the seats of top executives of the state government depicting the plight of this state made possible probably because Laloo Prasad Yadav, enraged by the Centre’s move to divide Bihar, ensured that the cadres of all tainted IAS officers, Bihar Administrative Service Officers, Engineers and employees who had plundered Bihar for years were transferred to Jharkhand.