Thursday, July 4, 2019

Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'An IAS officer is not above Law' that was published in Newsband


An IAS officer is not above Law
The Odisha government has transferred Rashmita Panda, District Collector of Sundargarh, who was accused of splurging ₹70 lakh on the renovation of her official residential quarters within a period of six months. Ms. Panda has now been appointed as Director of Employment-cum-Chief Executive Officer of the Odisha Skill Development Authority.
No tender was called for renovation of her quarters in Rourkela. After the issue attracted media attention, the government shifted her to the Employment Directorate. Accountability is the best policy and if government lives up to this policy, best lessons can be taught to others to follow the true path.
The government should first file a case aginst Panda since she enjoyed the public money. Take a disciplinary action against her; then only public will respect the government. Just a transfer won't suffice. She has to be kept under suspension pending inquiry and the amount must be recovered from her salary. She is not authorized to spend government money as she pleases. What kind of selection method the UPSC adopts, not able to project the future behavior of such individuals? What happened to psychometric tests and their applicabality?
Is government giving her a new chance to make a new scam? Is transfer a punishment for any kind of criminal activities done by a Civil Personnel? There is need to check if there were administrative and technical sanctions issued by the competent authority in the government. Also the said work being a technical work of civil construction nature,the project as a whole, needed to be sanctioned by competent technical authority after an estimate of the well planned work was prepared and got sanctioned  well before putting the work to tender. Splitting of work with a view to get it within one`s competence is further a gross financial irregularity also appear to have taken place.
It`s amazing how the accounts authorities fail to advise their officers to act in a manner that is desired under government`s finance and account rules which clearly lay down how the works get executed. It was, in fact, a job of State PWD or the CPWD. If the said DC wanted to do repair works in her residence, her office should have approached the PWD authorities in the official manner required. Why no disciplinary action was taken against the officer? Isn't it worth investigating whether the officer received any kickbacks out of 70 lakhs spent? Is there no punishment for corrupt officers? Is Judicial system a joke? Disciplinary action should be initiated to correct this mistake. It is mind-boggling that such blatant misuse of taxpayer funds does not result in censure stronger than a mere transfer of the corrupt official. What way the shifting is going to help? The government should have recovered half of the money from her. It would be worthwhile to go deep down in to the way how she got IAS.
Departmental disciplinary action needs to be initiated and 70 Lakhs recovered from her. What stops her from spending similar amount on the new house that she occupies? There is no link between money matter and her transfer. She is not the alone who have been transferred to various posts recently. She has by passed rules to avoid tendering and executed renovation of residential quarter by spending less than 5 Lakhs. It is a matter of offence and punishable. She has misused public funds which is punishable. She should not only be transferred but case under relent section should be levelled upon her.
Doesn’t government not have guts to transfer an IAS or is she a part of some politician family? Or is it that only corrupt people can live freely in this country? She learnt the tricks of living king size life at tax payers' money, very early in career. She has great future in Indian Babudom.
Special repairs are required for VIP residences, no doubt; but a poor state like Odisa recovering from recent cyclone disaster cannot afford. At least the repairs should have been carried out in phases, not all at the same time.  Only state PWD should have carried out the repairs after scrutiny and tender process.

No comments:

Post a Comment