Government is already spent lacs of crores rupees in Air India and now is spending more 1,50,000 crore of rupees ($30 bn) in developing airports.
Airport travelling was never affordable for common people except when air deccan was operating under leadership by Capt. Gopinath. With high airport service charges, additional development fees and various taxes it way beyond reach of general public.
Airline travel is only affordable to wealthy and rich and is used for travelling with needs to do commercial deals by Corporates or leisure activities by wealthy. There is no benefit to general public and more over the money would be distributed leniently to corporates working on the project with the actual execution cost in multiples of estimated cost.
Blatant misuse of public money by corrupt practices.
Goa government to maintain database of tainted officials to weed out corruption
State Vigilance Department has issued a circular to all the Heads of Departments (HoDs) to prepare a list of the officers having “doubtful integrity” and the ones who might have been involved in corrupt practices.
“It’s an entire exercise to give corruption-free governance,” George said, adding that those officers whose names figure in the list will be kept away from sensitive departments.
Taxi drivers and auto rickshaw drivers are demanding hike in fares as inflation is driving prices of essential commodities.
Taxi drivers have decided to go on an indefinite strike from May 2 if the government fails to form a new committee to decide fare hikes and to demand a further increase of Rs 3 in the tariff.
Members of taxi unions met in Dongri on Sunday. Union leader A L Quadros, who chaired the meeting, said, “The minimum fare should be increased from Rs 17 to Rs 20. We want the government to appoint a new panel to decide fare hikes. If the state transport department fails to form the committee by May 2, all taxis will go off roads indefinitely.”
Union leader Sharad Rao has also called for an indefinite strike of autos across Maharashtra from April 16 to demand a fare hike of Rs 5 in basic fare and Rs 2 for every subsequent km.
After a four-day weekend, get set to sweat it out and leg it to work. With two big auto unions planning morchas early this week, several autos are expected to stay off roads on Monday and Tuesday. Passengers can expect a shortage of autos in certain areas, especially in the western suburbs, sources said.
“We will submit a memorandum to the commissioner to highlight our demand for a fare hike,” said Kurian. “The recent introduction of e-meters in autos should be taken into account while deciding the fare hike. In comparison to mechanical meters which have a long life, e-meters have to be replaced every three years and their batteries need to be changed every two years. This means incurring an expense of Rs 5,000 every two to three years,” he said.
“Also, the maintenance cost of an e-meter and CNG engine are high,” said Kurian, adding that drivers incur losses while waiting in long queues for CNG.
Primary reason for inflation and hardship for common people is diversion of funds and corrupt practices which causes price rise in essential commodities. This in turn is causing working class to demand higher returns for their efforts. Current demands by Auto Rickshaw drivers and Taxi drivers are part of same story. Their demand for amount of hike could be unjustified and subjective to analysis.
Social activist Anna Hazare on Sunday said that people should first bring about a change in their own localities before thinking of changing the country
“First change your locality and then think of changing the country. The lanes should be developed first to bring about a change in the country,” Mr. Hazare said.
The social activist, who hails from Ralegan Siddhi village in Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra, said in his village people used to sleep without food, water and other facilities earlier. “But then people changed it and prosperity can be seen all over now,” he said.
When a government repeatedly ignores peaceful appeals for positive change, how should the frustration of people be expressed (short of taking up violence)? Fasting is a peaceful method of putting one’s self in jeopardy in order to bring attention of the powers that be.
Even as per the book definition, “blackmail” applies to the use of extortion or threats of causing harm in order to obtain material benefits for self. Anna threatened no one. He demanded nothing for himself.
2. Was the government’s bowing to Anna’s demands coerced?
The government’s agreeing to Anna’s demands was a democratic (not coerced) victory because the tiny fraction of the people of India who participated in the action represented the hearty desires of the masses against corruption. It was the massive outpouring of public support worldwide that caused the government to bow and not just Anna’s fast.
At least here, the government’s action also needs to be commended where they did not make it a prestige issue or try to use brutal force to put down a people’s movement (unlike Egypt and Libya).
3. Ambedkar had said civil disobedience must stop after independence, so why is this allowed now?
Gandhi fasted even after independence. Furthermore, Ambedkar’s statement above was made in the euphoria following independence. If Ambedkar were to see the state of affairs today, he would have advocated all the methods of peaceful civil disobedience, including fasting.
In reality, Gandhi’s fight was not against the white-skinned man (British) but rather against the methods of governance that amounted to injustice, national loot, and falsehood. This is the state of the nation even today, and thus those methods of peaceful protests still hold good.
4. It weakens democracy when an activist group forces the government and elected representatives to do what they want. Why shouldn’t they contest elections and win to get their voice heard?
Our politicians, having forgotten that in a democracy people are the masters, have started treating them as subjects. The democratic electoral system now functions for those who have muscle, money and media power (the 3M’s). That is why it is not an option for an honest group of citizen to come to power through the electoral system and make reforms.
To the extent that the government has been forced to listen to the people’s voice, IAC movement has actually strengthened our democracy. When an effective Lokpal bill is implemented, among other things, it will reduce the ‘profitability’ of public office, reduce the role of money in elections and lead to more honest elections which in turn will lead to a better democracy.
Political parties with ample representation in the executive as well as legislature hold bandhs, dharnas, rasta rokos, burn buses, and destroy public property. And, the political parties are asking why we resort to fasts?
5. Isn’t there is a danger that others will copy the same methods?
Replicating success simply by copying the fast may be difficult, because the power of fasting comes from the integrity of the satyagrahi, and the popularity of the cause. If Anna sits for a fast demanding that everybody in his village be made rich, there won’t be people fasting with him in dozens of towns and cities and nobody will even ask him to stop the fast.
Gandhi had also said everyone should fast for self purification, which leads to the achievement of goals.
Team Anna Campaign in UP, captured on video, the overwhelming response.
Chandigarh CSFL report in Bhushan CD case
Prashant Bhushan’s Statement
This report, after 8 months since it came into existence, has been given to Subash Chandra Aggarwal by the Chandigarh CSFL on Central Information Commission’s order. The Delhi Police refused to give this report to Mr. Shanti Bhushan despite his repeatedly asking for the same. Despite the fact that they distributed the dishonest Delhi CFSL report which certified the CD to be genuine to the entire media. Even the PMO in response to RTI of Subhash Aggarwal gave him only Delhi CFSL report and not the Chandigarh report.
Moreover, the Delhi Police did not send the Amar Singh-Mulayam Singh CD to the CFSL lab which would have conclusively shown that all of Mulayam Singh speech in this fabricated CD had been cut and pasted onto the CD from the Amar Singh tapes, which has been filed in the Supreme Court on 2006. Mr. Shanti Bhushan had given a copy of the Amar Singh CD to the Delhi Police and we had conclusively demonstrated in a Press Conference on April 17, 2011 that Mulayam Singh speech had been merely cut and pasted on this fabricated CD from the Amar Singh tape.
The interest taken by the Home Minister P Chidambaram in this matter and the PMO in revealing the Delhi CSFL report while withholding the Chandigarh CFSL report shows that the Government is behind the dissemination of this fabrication, if not the actual fabrication itself. This was the beginning of the repeated attempts by the Government to defame important members of the anti-corruption campaign – an attempt which continues till this day.
To download Chandigarh CSFL Report Goto URL: http://www.box.com/shared/static/tcx027lf10jevn1jphmx.pdf
Preliminary Response to Standing Committee Deliberations
The issue of Lokpal is before Parliamentary standing committee. Team Anna has already made its submissions before the standing committee. The reports filtering out of standing committee discussions are a cause of concern for the following reasons:
1. Anna suspended his fast in August on the basis of a resolution passed by the Parliament of India which was termed as “Sense of House” by some people but was referred to as a “resolution” by the Prime Minister in his letter to Shri Anna Hazare. This resolution clearly stated that three issues would be addressed through the Lokpal Bill namely Lokayuktas in states would be created through the same bill and lower bureaucracy and citizens charter would be included in the lokpal bill. However we are surprised that contrary to that resolution, the government proposes to exclude citizen charter and lower bureaucracy from Lokpal’s jurisdiction and bring a weak and ineffective bill to deal with citizens grievances.
2. Exclusion of Group C and Group D employees from the jurisdiction of Lokpal: It is being reported in the media that the jurisdiction of Lokpal would be confined to Group A and Group B employees of Central Government only and the jurisdiction of state Lokayuktas would be confined to Group A and Group B employees of that state Government only. Lokpal/Lokayukta would not have jurisdiction to investigate allegations of corruption against Group C and D employees. We strongly oppose this for the following reasons:
a. If Group C and Group D employees are excluded then would this mean that they could indulge in corruption and they would not be investigated by any agency? Aren’t we giving them a license to indulge in corruption?
b. It is being argued that their corruption would be investigated by CVC. This is misleading because firstly CVC has jurisdiction only over Group A employees. Secondly, CVC is an advisory body. Thirdly, CVC is not a police station and hence does not have power to register an FIR and do criminal investigations. Fourthly, CVC does not have necessary financial and human resources (it just has a staff strength of 230 employees). Therefore, it is misleading to say CVC would investigate allegation of corruption against Group C and Group D employees.
c. A common man has to deal with Group C and Group D employees on a daily basis. Lakhs of people who participated in this anti corruption movement wanted a solution to this day to day corruption. If Group C and Group D employees are excluded, where would a common man go and report his day to day corruption?
d. Some people say that there is hardly any scope for corruption at the level of Group C and Group D employees. This is incorrect. Inspectors who are infamous for indulging in corruption are Group C employees. It is the Group D staff which is notorious for stealing the critical files from government organizations. So where would all these cases be reported? Which agency would investigate all these cases?
e. In states, maximum corruption takes place at the level of Group C and Group D employees. Almost Rs 30,000 crores worth of ration meant for poor people is annually siphoned off by Group C and Group D employees. Thousands of crores of leakage takes place in NREGA works at the level of Group C and Group D employees. Panchayat secretary and panchayat officials are Group C and Group D employees. Huge amount of corruption takes place in panchayat works. Who would investigate all this corruption?
f. It is being claimed that Lokpal/ Lokayukta institutions would become unwieldy if all employees were brought under their jurisdiction. This is wrong. Firstly we need to appreciate that India is a large country with 120 crore population. Therefore it has a large bureaucracy. Central government itself has 60 lakh employees (including PSUs). Group A and Group B employees put together are less than 3 lakhs. So should we allow the balance 57 lakh employees to keep on indulging in corruption and not provide any systems against their corruption? This is completely unacceptable to us. By international standards, you would need a total staff strength of 30,000 people in Lokpal to check corruption of 60 Lakh employees. A central government department consisting of 30,000 personnel is a middle size department. It is not such a big department. Most of the central government departments like Railways, Post Office, Defence, Income Tax etc are much bigger than this size. So why are we getting overawed and overwhelmed by this sized Lokpal?
g. It is being alleged that if Lokpal started investigating small cases of corruption then big fish would go scot free. This is wrong. Lokpal will have to create its work systems in such a manner that its normal staff spread across the country would handle smaller cases of corruption. Lokpal could create special units to deal with high level corruption. These units could be directly monitored by Lokpal members. This is how CBI and Income Tax department presently function. CBI has regional offices to deal with smaller corruption but has a few Special Investigating Units in Delhi for high level corruption. Likewise, ordinary income tax officers spread across the country deal with lower income tax payers. But income tax department has separate investigation wing and special commissioners to deal with high level tax evaders. If income tax department can check the tax evasion of more than 3 crore tax payers, then why can’t Lokpal check corruption of 60 Lakh central government employees. In the case of states, the total number of employees is even lesser. The number of all employees including Group A, B, C and D put together would be less than 5 lakh in any state government.
h. A question is being raised that how would one ensure the integrity of such a huge staff in Lokpal? Where would so many honest people come from? We first need to appreciate that there has been a huge vacuum of anti corruption staff in our country. There are some state governments which have less than 10 staff for the entire state in their anti corruption bureau and state vigilance department put together. Delhi police has less than 15 vigilance officers to check the corruption of more than 85,000 police officials. So therefore there is an urgent need to employ adequate number of anti corruption staff and fill this vacuum. There is so much of corruption in Income Tax department. Does this mean that we should wind up IT department? No. The country does need an Income Tax department. The answer lies in putting right kind of systems in place in Income Tax so that the scope for corruption reduces and also making Income Tax officials responsible and accountable. Likewise, the time has come to first put adequate number of anti corruption staff in place on one hand and to make their functioning transparent and accountable on the other hand so that the institution of Lokpal/ Lokayukta itself doesn’t turn corrupt.
3. Keeping CBI out of Lokpal’s control: It has been reported that CBI will not be merged with Lokpal. According to media reports, Lokpal would receive complaints of corruption, refer them to CBI, CBI would do the investigation and send its report to Lokpal and then Lokpal would file chargesheet in the court. Doesn’t that reduce Lokpal to merely a post office- receive complaints, forward it to CBI, receive CBI’s report and present it before the court. Then why do we need a Lokpal? Why can’t CBI directly receive complaints, do its investigations and directly file chargesheet in the court? This is exactly what CBI does today. However, today CBI is in government’s control. Government exercises administrative and financial control over CBI. Government appoints its director and staff. Because of these controls the government is able to unduly influence CBI investigations. If CBI continues to be under government’s control and if government is able to influence CBI investigations, then how is proposed system better than the present system? In any case of corruption, honest investigations are most important. Prosecution would be successful only if investigations have been honest and effective. Government proposes to keep investigations with itself by retaining its control over CBI. This has been the biggest obstacle in our anti corruption system so far. There is a direct conflict of interest in government’s control over CBI because CBI is controlled by the very same people against whom there are allegations of corruption. Therefore it is extremely critical that CBI were unshackled from government’s control; and converted into the investigative arm of Lokpal.
4. Corruption in Judiciary: We had initially proposed that allegations of corruption by judges should also be investigated by Lokpal/Lokayukta. However the government assured that they would address judicial corruption through Judicial Accountabilty Bill (JAB). We agreed to that. Unfortunately, the JAB presented by the government in Parliament and the standing committee report thereon do not make any mention of criminal investigation of corruption against judges. This means that if any judge indulges in corruption, he could neither be investigtated under Lokpal Bill nor under JAB. We strongly demand that since criminal investigation of judges has been left out of JAB, it should now be included in Lokpal Bill.
5. Protection of whistleblowers: A number of RTI activists and those who raise their voice against corruption are being targeted, victimized and assaulted. They need to be provided effective protection. It is apprehended that as soon as a person would make a complaint to Lokpal, he would be victimized. Since Lokpal would know the details of his case, it would be in best position to provide protection to that person. However, the government proposes to address this issue through yet another bill which gives the power to provide protection to whistleblowers not to Lokpal but to CVC. In 2003, in Satyendra Dubey case, Supreme Court had made CVC as the nodal agency for providing protection to whistleblowers against professional and physical victimization. In the last 8 years, despite receiving large number of requests, CVC has failed to provide protection even in a single case. This is because CVC has neither resources nor powers to fulfill those obligations. More than 13 RTI activists have been murdered in the last few years. CVC could not protect any one of them. Even the standing committee which studied the proposed bill for providing protection to whistleblowers, strongly felt that CVC was not the right agency to be given that job. Therefore, we strongly urge that the duty to protect whistleblowers should be given to Lokpal under the Lokpal Bill.
6. Public Grievances: The government proposes to address this issue through yet another bill. However, the proposed bill is bound to collapse within a few days of its enactment. This is because it proposes a highly centralized system. According to the proposed bill, if a citizen fails to get his grievance redressed from the grievance redressal officer and the head of that department, the grievance would go to the sate public grievance commission consisting of 5 members and stationed at state capital. One wonders how would this 5 member body deal with grievances from all the villages and cities of the entire state which could run into lakhs, if not crores. Still worse is the fact that an appeal against state public grievance redressal commission would lie before a 5 members Central public grievance commission stationed in Delhi. This 5 member central public grievance commission would be expected to solve all the grievances against all state and central government departments of 120 crore population. Obviously the system is designed to collapse. We would strongly recommend that the system implemented by Uttarakhand recently should be adopted. In this system, if a citizen fails to get his grievance redressed from the concerned officer, there are two levels of appeals provided in the same department. If he is still aggrieved, the appeal would lie before a judicial officer of state lokayukta stationed in the same district. Lokayukta has been given the power to appoint as many judicial officers as is required at district or block level. If a grievance reaches judicial officer of Lokayukta, judicial officer is required to act in a very tough manner. He would be required to impose financial penalty on guilty officers which would be deducted from the salaries of these officers and paid as compensation to the aggrieved citizen. Repeated violations of citizens charter would be deemed to be an act of corruption and could lead to imprisonment and/or dismissal of guilty officers. Such a huge deterrent would ensure that the grievances get solved within the department itself.
Therefore the government proposes to remove CBI, judiciary, citizen charter, whistleblower protection, Group C and Group D employees and CBI from Lokpal jurisdiction. Wouldn’t that reduce Lokpal to an empty tin box with no powers and functions?
Arvind Kejriwal on Smt Sonia Gandhi’s statement and Bihar Lokayukta
Arvind Kejriwal’s Tweets:
1. On Sonia Gandhi’s statement: IAC welcomes UPA Chairperson’s commitment on Lokpal. We sincerely hope the Government would honour her commitment of getting a strong and effective Lokpal during the winter session. Mere speeches would not be enough from the Government’s side.
2. On Bihar Lokayukta:
Bihar Govt’s proposed Lokayukta Bill is a copy of much criticised Centre’s draft against which Anna sat on a fast. For instance:1. Selection, suspension and removal of Lokayukta will be in Govt’s control and therefore it will not be independent.
2. To investigate and prosecute any Govt officer, Lokayukta will need permission from the Govt
3. Punishment to a complainant if he files frivolous complaint and punishment for a corrupt officer is the same (6 months to 5 yrs)
4. Corrupt officers to get free legal assistance provided by Govt against the complainant
These are the same provisions that were there in Central Govt’s draft of Lokpal Bill and Anna sat on a fast against these provisions.
We sincerely wish that Nitish Kumar ji brings a strong Lokayukta Bill on the lines of Uttarakhand
I strongly condemn violence on protesters :
Arvind Kejriwal
In Nagpur, there was a huge gathering. The hall could accommodate less than 1000 people. There were more than double that no seated in a ground just outside the hall with speakers and an LCD screen. The program went off quite well.Almost at the end of the program, I was told by one of the organizers that some people were standing outside the hall with black flags protesting against me. I requested him to call them inside on the stage. “We will talk to them. If they have any doubts, it is our duty to remove those doubts,” I told him.
That person came back after a while and told me that the police had taken them away. I announced from the stage that we are not against anyone and if anyone had any questions, we welcome them. If we are doing anything wrong, kindly let us know. We would try our best to rectify our mistakes.
Today in the morning, I have come to know from newspapers that those protesting against me outside the hall were chased and assaulted by some people sitting in the audience in the ground. Obviously, I did not come to know about these developments because all this was happening outside the hall. The pictures in the newspapers are troublesome. Personally, I am deeply pained to read this.
I strongly condemn the violence on protestors. Everyone has a right to protest. This is a people’s movement against corruption. Every citizen is a part of this movement. Those who were protesting against me are also a part of this movement. They are our friends. If they have any questions or suggestions or grievances, we will talk to them. We should not attack them. I apologise to those who were assaulted and invite them for discussions. If we have been doing anything wrong in the movement, I assure them that we will correct ourselves.
I also urge those friends who assaulted the protestors not to do this in future. Such violence is not only against the basic ethos and philosophy of the movement but would also weaken the movement. Anna keeps saying – “hamare andar apmaan sehne ke shakti honi chahiye. Humen bade se badi kurbani ke liye tayyar rehna hai.” Such acts of violence are contrary to this philosophy. It only shows our impatience. We have to win over people through love and dialogue. Beating them up would alienate them forever and divert the issues.
I urge all those who feel that they are a part of this movement never to indulge in any kind of violence.
Team Anna’s Phones Tapped
Arvind Kejriwal
Phones of all Team Anna members are being tapped. We always had this hunch but had no evidence. Some incidents have occurred in the last few days, which confirm our suspicion. Day before yesterday, one of anna’s assistants read out his note to me which said that anna would like to go to Rajghat for a while when he came to Delhi. He wanted that this should not be disclosed to anyone as he wanted to sit there alone in peace for sometime. Within 15 minutes of this conversation. Our office got a call from the police asking us to give all details of anna’s visit to Rajghat. We were completely shocked.
As per law, phones of only those people could be tapped who are a threat to national security. Is Anna and his team a threat to national security?
Permission to tap phones under present law is given by Home Secretary. Would the Home Secretary or Home Minister clarify whether such permission was ever given to any agency to tap our phones? If yes, how is Team Anna a threat to national security?
Corrupt people are the real threat. Interestingly, they are the ones who have the power to give permission to tap phones or order investigations against themselves.
Any intelligence agency, including anti-corruption agency, can tap phones after obtaining permission from Home Secretary. Present Home Secretary’s immediate boss P Chidambaram is under cloud for his alleged role in 2G scam. Obviously, no home secretary would ever give permission to any agency to investigate against his own boss. We have been demanding that after Lokpal were set up, such permission should be given by a bench of Lokpal rather than Home Secretary. Government has been opposing this for obvious reasons.
3rd Feb 2012, Panvel,
Revenue produced by the RTO department of Panvel is more than 80L/day i.e. ~18Cr. for 22days in a month said Asst. RTO Krishnadutt Jadhav in the meeting with IAC Navi Mumbai Volunteers . Navi Mumbai Coordinator Ravi Srivastav asked if atleast you get 10% of the revenue collected, by the government then you can even adjust GPS System in Auto rickshaws, Asst. RTO replied “we just need only 1% of the revenue to maintain our infrastructure and mechanism from government, we don’t even have ground for the Test Drive if we will get 10% then we can not only implement all the mechanism you said we can also put up centralized A/c to our infrastructure”.
If the revenue collected by the different departments are not flowing for there better mechanism of there department then where is the flow of this channel is ?. . . .
The Shri Anna Hazare lead India Against Corruption, Mumbai (IAC-Mumbai), has planned an elaborate indefinite fasting and satyagrah program, with Annaji being in Mumbai from the evening of Monday 26th December. The fall back site will be Azad Maidan which has been lucky for AnnaJi and IAC-Mumbai for the past many years. Due to the increasing list of Volunteers signing in for fasting, exceeding 1,000 already, it has become important to investigate alternate sites in Mumbai. For this purpose, MMRDA grounds in BKC – Bandra East, has been shortlisted. Suitable application has been made to the authorities concerned. The permission and finalization of layout and site plan is underway. The best of architects and planners are involved from the Volunteers and other advisors. The same will be submitted to contractors and service providers, coming Tuesday, as soon as formal permission is accepted by us.
