Opinion Some more vigilance
Oommen Chandys hard times.
Frankly,even the heart of a politically hardened Malayali like me goes out to Chief Minister Oommen Chandy. He is in no enviable place,despite being a decent person,a workaholic chief minister and,untypical for a Congressman (and the CPM comrades too),a democrat. He has a secular reputation,a sense of fairness,no airs,a remarkable capacity to listen patiently to hundreds of people at a stretch and take pains to redress grievances. Unlike his predecessors in the Left Democratic Front (LDF) ministry who wouldnt go about without terrorising the common man with an obscene parade of armed policemen at back and front,he moves around without fanfare.
A webcam installed in his office opens it up worldwide 24×7. His office has become so accessible that recently an intruder seated himself in the CMs chair and made a few phone calls. A CPM comrade would have got the man beaten up,labelled the act a CIA conspiracy and called for a one-day bandh. The intruder in Chandys chair just went home. I,for one,immensely appreciated the fact that a citizen could walk into the CMs room and sit in his chair. It almost seemed like democracy was going places even amidst Keralas wretched political megalomaniacs.
Chandys plate is full with a thousand things that need to be urgently done for Keralas survival as a viable society,but his cup of sorrows is not only brimful but overflowing. Chandy is hemmed in from almost all sides. To start with,his government lives on a grand majority of a single digit two. (It used to be one,but the nominated Anglo-Indian representative makes it a whopping two.) The splinter parties who partner Chandys United Democratic Front (UDF),like the Kerala Congress factions,are notorious for slick treachery and stark opportunism. There is no saying when they will strike. The silver lining,however,is that the CPM is not yet ready to strike. It stands near-paralysed under V.S. Achuthanandans stony gaze. But things may change after the CPM state conference,scheduled for early February 2012.
Perhaps Chandys greatest foes are,as is normal in Congress culture,within the party itself. Its not only the various groups and factions at work for their own ends. Nor the seedy fortune hunters who haunt the KPCC office for candy-postings. (The candy-hunt is so heartless that even a model organisation like the State Institute of Childrens Literature is not spared. It brought a state-of-the-art dimension to childrens publishing in Malayalam in the last five years. But a scurrilous attack is on for its capture,plunder and inevitable destruction.) The Congressmen who have been eyeing the CMs chair have not forgiven Chandy. Back-stabbing is a natural-born act in politics and Chandy actually needs a second webcam to cover his back from Congressmen.
All this has been topped now by a court order by the special judge handling a vigilance case,celebrated in Malayalam media as the Palmolein case,in which Chandy is Court Witness No 23. It relates to the import in 1992 of palmolein (a cooking medium) when Kerala had experienced a cooking oil shortage. With the late K. Karunakaran as CM and Chandy as finance minister,the import was conducted by the civil supplies ministry headed by T.H. Mustafa,based on a cabinet decision. The prosecutions case is that the deal caused illegal pecuniary gain of Rs 2.32 crore to the suppliers.
When trial proceedings began in early 2011,the LDF government,then in power,asked for a further enquiry into the involvement of Chandy as finance minister in the palmolein import. The investigating agencys report of May 13,2011,exonerated the finance department of any irregularity in the import. On August 8,the special judge rejected the report,pointing out that the original purpose of the inquiry was to investigate Chandys involvemet,but the report only refers to the finance department. He has asked the agency to,again,investigate the role of CW23 (Oommen Chandy) in the import and submit a report within three months.
The cry has gone up for Chandys resignation. In a very un-politician-like manner Chandy hadnt shifted out the public prosecutors read comrades appointed by the LDF government. That puts him on a sticky wicket indeed. Well,when you are living on a majority of two,can anything look harder?
Zacharia is a Malayalam writer
express@expressindia.com
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