Now, an Income Tax Officer is arrested in Thane for taking bribe .
The following news item gives the facts.
At one time, lady government officers were expected to be honest. But times have changed.
Undisputably, there cannot be any gender discrimination. It is therefore only natural that the malaise has spilled over to the fair sex.

News Item

Woman I-T officer caught accepting Rs 1.5 lakh bribe

Nitin Yeshwantrao, TNN Nov 2, 2012, 02.44AM IST

THANE: A woman income tax (I-T) officer was remanded in police custody till Saturday after being caught red-handed by CBI sleuths accepting a bribe from a Thane builder. Accused Madhavi Chavan was picked up from the Wagle Estate I-T office late on Wednesday after she accepted Rs 1.5 lakh from Sandeep Salvi, a partner in a construction firm which has projects in Chiplun and Roha in the Konkan region.

Salvi and his associate Rajabhau Patkar had complained to the anti-corruption wing of the CBI in Mumbai about the alleged harassment and cash demand made by Chavan. They claimed Chavan had contacted them in September and said her superiors had issued orders for scrutiny of their tax papers. Patkar claimed Chavan asked them to pay Rs 10 lakh to cancel the scrutiny orders.

How to Fight Corruption

Corruption is big news today. A lot is being written and said about corruption.

Why is Bribery and Corruption Flourishing in India

Bribery and corruption (including similar activities in the private sector) are flourishing in India because the public is not only tolerating, but also encouraging, such activities.
People readily pay bribes to get work done….even if the work is totally illegal.
Parents seek prospective candidates for marriage with their children with an eye on the money they will make in future.
Worse, there is no stigma attached to illegal earnings.

How do you fight Bribery and Corruption

We already have several laws to fight all these……
We have a judiciary any democratic country can be proud of.
I personally believe that a new Lok Pal will only add one more layer of bureaucracy, a lot of expenditure, which we can hardly afford, and consequential corruption.

So how do we tackle the bribery and corruption?

• First…don’t pay bribe.
• Secondly, in case of government officials or public servants, file a complaint with the concerned Anti Corruption Department, and get the culprit arrested or caught red handed, while taking bribe.

Devrao Bawane, Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax Jailed

For those who disbelieve in the efficacy of the existing laws, I am attached a news paper cutting of today to show how effective our laws are.

Devrao Bawane, Deputy Commissioner of Sales Tax and his inspector have been sentenced  to 5 years rigorous imprisonment for taking bribe of Rs. 1 lakh in 2009.
And what has not been mentioned is that they will also lose their retirement benefits.

November 8, 2011 – I came across the above headlines in the Mumbai Mirror today. After having served the Government of India for four decades, and observing how it, or rather those who subvert the entire system function, I was not surprised.

A high ranking officer, allegedly caught taking a bribe of Rs. 2 crores is back in his post after a 18 month deemed suspension. What is surprising is why and how ?

The same tabloid contains a news item that a bus conductor sacked for Rs. 119 gets his job back after 11 years. The charge against him was there was shortage of Rs. 119 in his cash. 

 The Facts

Back to our hero, Mahendra Singh Bali (59), a 1978-batch Indian Postal Service officer, then Chief Postmaster General of Maharashtra, was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on February 25, 2010. for allegedly taking a bribe of Rs 2 crores from a builder.

The CBI  took the action on the basis of complaint by Rita Shah, a former Mira-Bhayander corporator. According to the complaint, Bali had asked for the bribe to issue a No Objection Certificate for developing a 2,000-sq-mt plot in Mira Road, part of which was reserved for a post office.

According to reports, after Bali’s arrest last year, the CBI carried out searches of his office and residence in south Mumbai,  and found 34 lakh in Indian rupees, and foreign currency – $10,722, £3,050, 3,470 Euro – from four briefcases.
The CBI also seized laptops, and 45 bottles of imported liquor.

Further enquiries revealed that Bali owned several properties in Faridabad, Panchkula, Dwarka, Bhopal and Gurgaon. The CBI found that he had 22 bank accounts with a total balance of Rs 26 lakhs. The collective value of the properties is still to be evaluated.

Central Administrative Tribunal

Bali challenged his suspension before the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), Mumbai which ordered his reinstatement last week. On November 4, 2011, Bali  was reinstated as the Chief Postmaster General of West Bengal.

The reinstatement was ordered on a technical ground  –  violation of the central civil service rules. “This was a case of deemed suspension. In such cases, the suspension has to be reviewed in 90 days, and as this was not done, the initial order was rendered invalid before the law,”

The issue is not about Bali. Even though Bali is reinstated, proceedings and prosecution will continue.

What should be done

It is for the government, for the CBI and the CVC to find out who are the officers who did not follow the central civil service rules, who did not review the suspension in accordance with the law, and allowed the central administrative tribunal to pass the order it did.

Some one should find this out and take action against the concerned officers.
Otherwise, this sort of aberrations will continue….the guilty will continue to be back in their posts……….

Any one has any better suggestions ?

November 9, 2011

Someone in Delhi has read the news and the result….
Bali has again been suspended yesterday.

I belong to the 1968 batch of Indian Revenue Service, senior to her in age and experience by several years.
A petty clerk, or for that matter, any other employee, both in the private and government sector, is dismissed from service for a single instance of similar over (or false) billing. Here we have a series of systematic false billings.

For all I know, the allegations may not be correct. I would be extremely happy if they are proved to be false.
Or they may be partly distorted.
But Kiran Bedi owes it to everyone to disclose the facts and come out clean. It is not sufficient for her and her friends to say, “ let the authorities make any enquiry against her and hang her  if she is guilty “.

Coming to the allegations.
What are the allegations? What are the facts? And why Kiran Bedi should disclose details of the concerned expenses?

It is a fundamental expectation that those who fight for transparency should themselves be transparent. Otherwise, they lose the moral authority to be leaders. The public will discard them like rotten maggots.

For the moment, the allegations may not prove corruption, but they certainly demand and merit transparency. Kiran Bedi should make public the relevant facts.

My own conclusions (which of course, may not be fully or even partly incorrect) are as follows:

1.      Kiran Bedi did ask for, and received, reimbursement of her inflated air travel fares, consistently and systematically, over several years. These were probably made on the basis of estimates (or proforma invoices) conveniently supplied by Anil Bal, her travel agent and co-trustee.

2.    Later, Kiran Bedi made payments for her travel expenses to Anil Bal, her travel agent and co-trustee on the basis of actuals, which of course are far less.

3.    Kiran Bedi claims that all the amounts she received, including some from other activities, like books, etc. went to the trust.

4.     The question arises whether or not Kiran Bedi attended the meetings and conferences in her personal capacity. If she did, then the entire excess of receipts less actual expenses would constitute her personal income. Of course, she can make donations to NGOs and claim exemption as per law. But all the receipts and expenses must be shown in her personal income tax returns.

5.     On the other hand, if she attended the meetings, etc. on behalf of her NGO, were the activities justified by the objects of the NGO.

6.    In any event, claiming air fare on the basis of false bills, I repeat false bills, is a serious crime.  The motives are not relevant. Robbing the rich to help the poor would constitute the same serious offence. The law is as simple as this.

7.    Kiran Bedi says enquire and hang me if I am guilty. Great words !  Who will file a complaint against you and invite problems?  Every prudent person will just keep mum.  And even if you are guilty, you cannot be hanged. There is no such penalty for such financial crimes. And everyone knows that an enquiry takes a long time……

8.    Kiran Bedi, if you have any sense of self respect, you should publish full details of all the concerned lectures and talks; names and addresses of the invitors, details of the expenses claimed, received and incurred, and on what basis you claimed the inflated expenses. You should also publish full details of your own personal contributions to the trust. After all what is there to hide?

9.     By the way, I went through the web site of her trust – India Vision Foundation.

http://www.indiavisionfoundation.org/donation-gallery.asp

There are no details of the various donations received…only a long list of names.
If this is what transparency is all about for our leaders, God help this nation.

The recent issues, incidents and happenings brought to the public glare by Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare, and hyped to the peak by the media, have left me totally bewildered and in a dizzy.

I have decided to go back to the very basics of corruption, political parties, and the role a government functionary like Santosh Hegde, can and should play in such matters.

Corruption

Corruption is a very serious issue plaguing all the not fully developed countries in the world.

Don’t be fooled into believing that there is no corruption in the developed countries. Corruption is very much there. The reasons for far lesser corruption are the very stiff penalties and swift punishment.
It simply does not make economic sense to take the enormous risks if caught.
The result is that you don’t have to pay bribes for day to day routine mundane matters.
.
Surprisingly, when we talk of corruption in India, we generally have the government employees and other public officials in mind.
After all, the Lok Pal movement is all about this kind of corruption only.

And the Karnataka Lokayukta, of which Santosh Hegde is the Chairman, broadly covers the same territory (for the State of Karnataka).

The fact is that corruption has permeated the entire society, including the private sector, down to the commonest man.
Just try to sell something to a big corporate body. The purchase manager or assistant will first talk about his commission.
Park your car in an authorized parking lot, say near the Gateway of India (Mumbai), or near the cinema theatres near V.T. (Mumbai), on a Sunday or some other holiday.
The parking attendant will ask for Rs. 100 or so in lieu of the prescribed Rs. 8 or so.

Take a metered taxi from Mumbai Airport to any part of South Mumbai.
The fare meter will show three to four times the correct fare.

When a boy is about to get married, his parents proudly flaunt his “oopari kamai”.
And this only ups his value in the matrimonial market, which translates into dowry.

If every person, who gets an opportunity to make some extra money, extracts money, things are not only serious, but call for a self cleaning movement.
Why don’t we try to preach this simple truth and meticulously follow it.

Bab Ram Dev

Perhaps Baba Ram Dev is a good yoga teacher.
Most of his claims about treating cancer, etc. remain unsubstantiated, or to be more precise, dubious.
But remember, it is not easy to extract money, call it donations or whatever you like, from powerful politicians and the rich and mighty.
Baba Ram Dev is certainly a great salesman – a salesman par excellence.

Being a sannyasi,  he should not have started the movement for such things as black money, demonetization of large currency notes, and even direct election to the post of prime minister.
But having started the wrong movement, he blotched up the movement,  more so,  by threatening to raise an armed army.
He should have retracted at the right moment and his public image would have remained untarnished.
Now there are more questions than he can answer.
And he has rightly chosen to keep mum.

I was shocked to see him jumping down the stage, running away like a pursued criminal, and then escaping in a sari.
I am yet to see a greater act of cowardice from a sannyasi.
Who could have hurt him in that public place ?
The media was his guarantee of safety, if any was needed.

You can see my comments on Baba Ram Dev on my blog.

Anna Hazare

Anna Hazare is an honest and clean person.
His intentions and motivations are beyond any shade of selfishness.

But in my view, equating  him to Gandhi is going too far.
Gandhiji was fighting against a foreign rule.
Whom are Anna’s team fighting with? Our own elected leaders
who are doing what they can legally do.

Anna Hazare’s intentions are good. His motives are honest.
But ultimately, it is the MPs and the law of the land which will have the final say.
I would wait and see how things turn out in the future.

At this stage, I would like to put a simple poser……can we say Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare are indulging in Politics ?

I am not very sure.

1. A political party is a group people who share the same ideas about the way the country should be governed.
2. They work together to introduce new laws, the alter old laws.
3. Political parties try to control what happens in Parliament by securing a majority of seats (Members of Parliament).
4. Political Parties have policies. A good example of a policy is “education must be free for all youngsters between the age of 5 to 18 years of age”.
5. Usually, when a political party wants to change Laws and Regulations they have to put their idea to all the Members of Parliament. A vote then takes place and if the majority of MPs vote ‘YES’ then the change to the Law/Regulation takes place.

http://www.technologystudent.com/pse1/polprt1.htm

The above definition deals with political parties which seek to contest elections.

Political parties that wish to contest local, state or national elections are required to be registered by the Election Commission of India (EC).

But there can be, and there are political parties, who do not wish to take part in elections.
In my opinion, what would ultimately decide whether a group is political or not would be the first two criterias:
1. A political party is a group people who share the same ideas about the way the country should be governed.
2. They work together to introduce new laws, the alter old laws.

Judged by this standard, both Baba Ram Dev and Anna Hazare’s movements are only political and their groups become political parties.

Santosh Hegde, Lokayukta, Karnataka

Well what does all this have to do with Santosh Hegde.
Karnataka has a Lokayukta Act and also a functional Lokayukta institution.
Let us see what a Lokayukta should not do:

Section 4 of the Lokayukta Act  – Lokayukta or Upalokayukta not to hold any other office

“Lokayukta or Upalokayukta not to hold any other office- The Lokayukta or Upalokayukta shall not be a member of the Parliament or be a member of the Legislature of any State and shall not hold any office or trust of profit (other than his office as Lokayukta or Upalokayukta) or be connected with any political party or carry on any business or practice any profession and accordingly, before he enters upon his office, a person appointed as the Lokayukta or an Upalokayukta shall-

(c) if he is connected with any political party, sever his connection with it; or ..

http://www.kar.nic.in/lokayukta/karnataka_lokayukta_act.htm

There is no doubt that the Lokayukta of Karnataka is a Government Servant, drawing salary, allowances and other perquisites from the Govt. of Karnataka.
I am sure he is expected to devote his entire time and energy to affairs of his office which are basically confined to Karnataka.

Yet, we find him in Delhi, along Anna group, and lobbying for his views.
How can anyone justify this kind of conduct, which in legal parlance is loosely termed….“Conduct unbecoming of a government servant.”

But again, who will bell the cat. If the Lokayukta decides to do what he should not do,
people like me can only grumble and have disturbing fitful dreams.
The reason is that the procedure for removing the Lokayukta is as follows:

Section 6 of the Lokayukta Act – Removal of Lokayukta or Upalokayukta

(1) The Lokayukta or an Upalokayukta shall not be removed from his office except by an order of the Governor passed after an address by each House of the State Legislature supported by a majority of the total membership of the House and by a majority of not less than two thirds of the members of that House present and voting has been presented to the Governor in the same session for such removal on the ground of proved misbehaviour or incapacity.

(2) The procedure of the presentation of an address and for the investigation and proof of the misbehaviour or incapacity of the Lokayukta or an Upalokayukta under sub-section (1) shall be as provided in the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968 in relation to the removal of a Judge and accordingly the provisions of that Act shall, mutatis mutandis, apply in relation to the removal of the Lokayukta and Upalokayukta as they apply in relation to the removal of a Judge.

Well, in my view what Santosh Hegde, the Lokayukta is doing is all wrong.
I would be grateful if someone could convince me that I am wrong and should modify or change my views.