Opinion Chief minister and crusader

One of the first individuals to actually fight corruption institutionally was the chief minister of Punjab,Sardar Pratap Singh Kairon. His efforts at curtailing corruption through systematic interventions soon yielded results. It also showed us the importance of structural,as contrasted with emotional,action in curbing corruption. By creating a specialised department,vigilance,to investigate charges of corruption,he ensured the public had a simple way of informing government of wrong-doings of civil servants.

Punjab in the years after Independence was in administrative chaos. The entire edifice of the state government had been left behind in Lahore. Instead,from Pakistan had come almost 6 million people in need of resettlement.

The property of those who had migrated to Pakistan needed to be documented and safeguarded. That alone provided opportunities to do wrong. Then there were the infrastructure projects that provided opportunities for siphoning off public monies. Land consolidation required remapping of agricultural land and it was believed that a small monetary gift to revenue officers could ensure a superior adjustment.

While other governments were busy making tall moral statements about the need to maintain probity,Punjab under Kairon had already begun to move forward to contain corruption. The solution Kairon found was to establish a direct link with the people to know how they were being treated by government servants. This was much like the present effort to display the name and phone number of the vigilance officer in each government department. The big difference between then and now is that people then were still substantially in thrall of government servants. It required a special effort on the part of Kairon to ensure people lost their fear. His continuous and energetic travelling across the state and intermingling with workers from the field provided much needed inputs.

Kairon also built around him a phalanx of officers known for their probity,efficiency and no-nonsense behaviour. Such officers were also given considerable freedom to exercise their initiative. When in May 1957,the Central government instructed state governments to use merit as a criterion in appointing officers to the Selection Grade,Kairon promptly created an institutional structure to separate the chaff from the grain,as it were.

Such actions,however,earned Kairon the ill will of many government servants. By 1955,he had some 400 of them dismissed for serious malfeasance. Some 8,000 complaints were received during 1955-59. Of these,4,000 were found to be baseless. Action was taken against some 2,000 people of whom 592 were dismissed from service.

Such actions endeared Kairon to the public. People voted for him. They also heeded his call to ignore the communal agitations being forced on the state by the Akalis,the Jan Sangh and the communists. Senior satraps from the Congress,moral do-gooders all,found themselves marginalised as Kairon expanded the Congress organisation.

Kairon’s detractors within his party now began to charge him with corruption. Under Chaudhary Devi Lal,the detractors decided to be extraordinarily vocal. A detailed investigation by the AICC allowed Nehru to exonerate Kairon in a long,formal address to Rajya Sabha. Never before,or after,would a prime minister of India exonerate one of his own thus. When even this did not satisfy the detractors,Nehru ordered an inquiry by Sudhi Ranjan Das,retired Chief Justice of India. This much publicised inquiry took a few months to conclude that none of the charges against Kairon stood. Yet,it recommended Kairon be held “guilty” for his sons having independent businesses.

Dasbabu agreed there was no evidence of corruption. Also that the sons,in their thirties,had set up businesses entirely independently.

Still,Kairon,corruption fighter par excellence,was given a swipe of the tar brush. Newspapers gleefully reported the matter. Historians continued to believe in Kairon’s corruption. Governments that followed benefited from the developmental path on which Kairon had put Punjab. But not even a chowk is named after Kairon in Punjab. Everyone seems to have conveniently forgotten the man of the people,fighter against official malfeasance and the one who set Punjab on to a path of growth.

The writer is professor of history,Panjab University,Chandigarh