NEW DELHI, FEB 16: Chief Vigilance Commissioner N Vittal, already in a soup for tangling with the bureaucracy, is now dangerously close to a showdown with the Union Government. The trouble this time is over his decision to refer to the CBI ``allegations'' of income-tax violations by senior political leaders named in the Jain hawala case, including four Union Ministers.Vittal's public announcement of the decision to television channels and newspaper correspondents today made the Government see red and it moved hastily to dismiss the allegations as ``false and baseless.'' The official spokesperson stressed that there was ``no concealment of income'' by the Union Ministers as suggested by the allegations forwarded by Vittal to the CBI.Clearly, the Government and the CVC are at odds with each other and highly placed Government sources reacted sharply to the embarrassment Vittal had caused. ``It is unbecoming of the CVC and damaging of the sensitive nature of his job to voluntarily seek media publicity,'' a senior Government official declared. ``He has breached policy by disclosing details of confidential communication between him and Director CBI.''The official also made it clear that Vittal had gone too far. ``Income Tax matters do not come under the CVC's jurisdiction. He has therefore overstepped his brief,'' he said. It was the first definition of the CVC's somewhat nebulous status in the absence of an Act giving him statutory powers. The requisite Bill is currently being debated by a joint select committee of Parliament.Vittal, however, begged to differ and said so openly. He told The Indian Express that politicians were out of his net, not subject matters. According to him, three options were before him on how to deal with the income tax allegations against the hawala-accused. ``One, I file a case. Two, I send the list to the Government. Three, I send it to the CBI. I chose the latter (since my department does not have the jurisidiction to look into corruption charges against politicians),'' he stated.The Government has taken serious note of Vittal's newest salvo which comes even before the storm over his website list of ``corrupt'' bureaucrats has subsided. The list, sent out over Internet, contained names of several officers against whom charges were yet to be proved and had the bureaucracy up in arms. The latest trouble erupted after a Hindi daily published a report this morning suggesting that the CBI would be investigating the source of vast sums of unaccounted money found in bank accounts belonging to some of the political leaders named in the hawala case.The Government spokesperson denied any move to reopen the hawala case after it was quashed by the High Court and the accused were formally discharged.
