Vigilance lets ‘corrupt’ officials off the hook under cover of special drive

Thiruvananthapuram: Over 4000 accused were cleared of the corruption charges against them under a special drive launched by the Government to dispose of pending files.

The charges against many, who were even denied pensions for long after being named in corruption cases, were “written off” in the special initiative by the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau.

This has even topped the cancellation of over 800 corruption cases inside a year by the then Vigilance director Loknath Behera.

Meanwhile, the Vigilance wing under the state Home department too wrote off nearly 30 recommendations forwarded by the Vigilance Director to the Government for filing cases and conducting inquiries under cover of the special drive.

The pending file disposal drive was a blessing to many, against whom the inquiry officers recommended registering corruption cases following quick inspections at various government departments. The Vigilance officials pointed out that many of them were denied eligible promotions and not extended pensions and other benefits even years after retiring from the service.

The special drive held recently became an escape route for the "corrupt" officials and former employees. Many files recommending strong action against the accused were disposed of at the Vigilance headquarters after taking minor department-level actions and penalties.

It was beside this that the Home Vigilance wing of the secretariat too exploited the opportunity. The Vigilance director had recommended to the Government the lodging of cases and conduction of corruption inquiries against nearly 60 people. However, the Government decided not to proceed with the probe against 30 of them and wrote off the recommendations. Many, including Executive Engineers, departmental heads, panchayat secretaries, and certain high-level officers of the public sector institutions, benefitted from the governmental decision.

VS’s recommendation too didn’t see the light of the day
The Kerala Administrative Reforms committee chaired by V.S. Achuthanandan had recommended in its initial report submitted during the first Pinarayi government to make the state Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau an independent agency on the lines of the CBI and also set up the state Vigilance commission on the model of the Central Vigilance Commission.

A sitting High Court or retired judge should be appointed as the state Vigilance Commissioner. The report further recommended that there should be two Vigilance Commissioners.

A person who had earlier assumed the chief secretary post and someone with experience working as the DGP or ADGP should be made the commissioners.

VS handed over the report directly to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan then.

However, the file was returned from the chief minister's office with the remark 'seen.' VS, who stepped down from the post upon completion of the government's tenure, openly expressed his disappointment over the non-implementation of the recommendation.