Maneka for President’s rule in Bihar

“Bihar is the only State in India where there is not even a trace of social justice, whatever the Chief Minister may say,” Gandhi said, soon after she presented the preliminary findings of a three-member team from her Ministry which had visited the site of the recent massacre in Jehanabad district of the State.

The team, headed by Kameshwar Paswan, Vice-Chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, visited Shankarbigha and met the victims. They found the situation in Shankarbigha pathetic; even the Collector of the district had not visited the place in the last 50 years.

The killings were pre-planned and politically motivated, where the perpetrators of thecrime wanted to make “a statement; that they could kill anyone and get away with it,” Gandhi said.

It was in this context that the Minister said, “I don’t know about others, but in the circumstances, yes, it is a fit case for President’s rule. At least, that is the view of my Ministry.”

Describing the experience of the Ministry with the Bihar administration, she said the maladministration, misuse of funds and complete lack of accountability had resulted in abysmal social and economic conditions in the State.

The Ministry, which has been conducting an audit of the functioning of the over 3,000 Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) funded by them, has blacklisted a number of them, including “some NGOs which did not exist except on paper, but had been drawing money from the (Welfare) Ministry”.

But disowning any responsibility for the unlimited outflow of funds to these NGOs, Gandhi said the money was disbursed after recommendations by the State Administration which would certify the NGO’sactivities. “What we found was that there would be a set of signatures and countersignatures vouching for the NGO’s activities where there were none, and the fraud was being committed down the line,” she said.

So the Ministry has decided to blacklist States which have taken money for such non-existent NGOs after fraudulent certification.

But in this too, Bihar takes the cake. According to the Minister, the Chief Secretary of Bihar has written to the Ministry not to entertain any requests with his signature, since it is being forged on all kinds of documents.

Resources earmarked for welfare schemes and poverty alleviation programmes were spent by the states on all kinds of things, including for paying wages, junkets abroad, and any other unforeseen expenditure which cropped up. The Ministry is now in the process of tightening it’s purse strings. It will no longer shell out funds to NGOs on the recommendation of the State: instead, money will be given to any NGO only after an independent assessment ofthe work being done by it.

“My natural instinct is to spend more money on Bihar than anywhere else, but who does one send the money to? It doesn’t matter how much money you put into Bihar, or how much goodwill you have. It is an extreme case of utter hopelessness. There is not a ray of hope,” Gandhi said despondently.