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| No 2 in most corrupt states' list, J&K may come into spotlight again as PAC "reveals" major fraud in PHE deptt | | | BHARAT BHUSHAN
JAMMU, Dec 9: Already declared as No 2 in the list of most corrupt states of India, J&K seems to be all set to come into the spotlight again, with seven MLAs -- all members of the committee on public accounts (PAC) -- having "revealed" a major fraud in public health engineering (PHE) department.
The department falls under Congress leader and minister Taj Mohiudin, against whom the "toothless" state accountability commission (SAC) has already registered a case in a land scam.
Next to him in the department is "tainted" commissioner/secretary Mehboob Iqbal. Surprisingly, Taj had opted to have him appointed PHE commissioner an year, or so back when his name already figured in three major multi-crore scams in the state: JAKFED scam, Gulmarg land scam and rural electrification scam.
As per the state policy, no tainted officer was to be given a plum posting till he was cleared of the charges but the minister, in this case, did not care for it despite the resistance from certain quarters in the state administration.
MLA Chaman Lal Gupta, who Wednesday headed the PAC meeting, even remarked: "Everyone nowadays wants to join PHE department."
A PAC member said sub-standard pipes, worth hundreds of crores, had been procured by PHE department, flouting all set norms and making a mockery of the tendering process.
He emphasised the need for a CBI probe. Chief minister Omar Abdullah ought to send the case for its indepth probe to CBI if he was really interested in giving a corruption-free administration, he added.
Omar has time and again reitrated that he was firm in dealing with corrupt officials and providing a clean, virtuos and working administration. His predecessor Ghulam Nabi Azad, after replacing Mufti Mohammad Syed as head of the coalition government in November 2005, too had made similar assertions, while committing to erase the bad name of the second corrupt state attributed to Jammu and Kashmir.
But when it came the turn of the two leaders to prove that their bark matched their bite, they virtually failed and found themselves in a state of predicament.
Azad had even said that, besides corrupt officials, strict action would also be taken against corporate houses, businessmen and touts who were found involved in bribing government officials and politicians.
But nothing happened on ground. The institutional patronage of corruption did not stop anywhere.
A record number of more than 1,500 complaints have been registered in the state since 2005 against ministers, chief secretary, a director general of police, influential persons and several top bureaucrats, including commissioners and heads of different
departments.
These cases were registered with the state vigilance organisation (SVO), CBI and SAC. Even SVO had come under the SAC scanner, following alleged complaints of corruption against some of its functionaries.
When retired Supreme Court judge, Justice R P Sethi (now dead) headed it, SAC had registered cases against the then haj, auquaf and sports minister Peerzada Mohammad Syed in the over Rs 2 crore rural electrification scam, Taj Mohideen in a land scam and some other ministers.
SAC had also registered cases against the then health commissioner S V Bhave, AIDS control society project director G M Wani and others for allegedly making fraudulent appointments in the society.
Cases were also registered against a deputy commissioner and a chief education officer in Kashmir for their alleged involvement in illegal appointments of teachers under Rehbar-e-Taleem scheme.
Inspite of the mounting pressure on him from the opposition and his own party, Azad had not dropped Peerzada and Taj even after they were allegedly indicted on corruption charges.
During the same time, Taj had also remained in the dock for his questionable role in the distribution of relief among the earthquake survivors.
Now that the House members had revealed a "fraud" in PHE department, it remains to be seen if the government would suo moto announce a probe into it to restore the trust of the people in the administration.
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