Zero Tolerance

It was heartening to know that the Minister of State for Personnel had made a statement about zero tolerance for corruption. In his statement he has highlighted that the Government is planning a legislature for whistleblowers protection. But five years after the Supreme Court judgement in Satyendra Dubey case the Government is still planning a legislature. The whistleblowers resolution brought by the CVC is lying dumped somewhere. Infect in one of its recent observation the Supreme Court observed that
"Everyone wants to loot this country. The only deterrent is to hang a few corrupt persons from the lamp post,".........The only way to rid the country of corruption is to hang a few of you from the lamppost. The law does not permit us to do it but otherwise we would prefer to hang people like you from the lamppost..- a bench of Supreme Court justices S.B. Sinha and Markandeya Katju 7/3/07

But we need to understand how the whistleblower program happens in India. Say, you have a complaint to make and you write to the President of India. The office of President will forward the complaint to the secretary of the Department, who will give it to the Additional Secretary who will pass the complaint to joint secretary and finally it will land at the table of the same officer against whom the complaint is made.

Imagine a different scenerio you write to the CVC under the Public Interest disclosure Resolution (PIDR). The CVC will make secrecy to the extent that it will put a white ink on all the file references where your name appears. But the person against whom the complaint is made is always aware that who made a complaint and he can carry his vendetta against the complainant. The person is so sure that who made the complaint that he can even stand in the Court and point a finger towards the complainant as to he made a PIDR complaint against me. The point is that when the person against whom the complaint is made is aware about the complainant identity then the PIDR is a joke. Even when the complainant files before the CVC that he appehends a danger to his life then also his letter is forwarded to the Secretary of the same Department against whom the complaint is. The issue is no wrong can happen without the approval of the Secretary then why CVC refers the matter back to him. or is the CVC just for the small fishes and a big catch (IAS Officer) is never in CVC perview.

Has the CVC given some guidelines for the whistleblowers ? Does the CVC even calls the person for an evidence ? The person against whom the complaint is made is given 7-8 opportunities for his reply, but the whistleblower is not even given an opportunity to file rejoinders to the replies. Is there a re-habilitation program for the whistleblowers if he is adversely affected by the corruption in that Department.

Infect there are examples where the predecessors of MOS (P) have intervened with CVC to let the matter be dropped. Whatever may be the circumstances the CVC is capable of investigations then why do Ministers intervene. or do they intervene just to get laptops at home and office. The Ministers in India cannot be too cheap and there must be more than what appears to the eye.

In the Indian system the whistleblower will be pushed from pillar to post to collect evidence which is the duty of investigating agency.Infect one agency will not even lookinto the evidence collected by the other agency.

But there are many social lectures which will criticize the complainant as to he is fighting a dead system. As though it is his fault that he filed a complaint and that he is guilty for it. People will call you not tuned with the changing time. In Government there is the legal bar in the form of the Official Secrets Act and Conduct Rules. In the private sector there are non-disclosure agreement by which employees are gagged from disclosing matters to the public on pain of incurring criminal or civil liability.

Satyendra Dubey and Shanmughan Manjunath are just to examples of the cruelty of Indian system. There are more who die a death everyday and five years after the death of Satyendra Dubey our Minister still plans to bring a legislature without committing on timelines. Actions speak louder than words, Sir

A lesson I learnt very hard and would like to share with all...
"If you must sin, sin against God, not against the bureaucracy. God may forgive you, but the bureaucracy never will!