Imphal, February 23: Along with classifying some Government Departments as 'sensitive' in term of corrupt practices and failure to nail corrupt officials in time, the State Vigilance Commission has recommended to the Government for setting up Vigilance Cell in each of these Departments.

The Departments that have been classified as sensitive in the annual report of the Vigilance Commission are DRDA, District Council, Education (S), Power, Health Services, Works, Revenue, Rural Development & Panchayati Raj, Social Welfare and Veterinary & Animal Husbandry.

Though there has been some improvement in the response of the Administrative Departments to references from the Commission, the annual report took serious note of fact that these departments have to play a more effective role in starting departmental enquiries on the recommendation of the Commission and in ensuring that the Departmental enquiries are completed expeditiously so that guilty officials can be punished promptly.

The report noted that there seems to be no practice prevalent for annual inspection of offices by the Head of Department/Independent Agencies except perhaps by the audit.

Threfore, the Commission feels that the Government should introduce an effective system of annual inspection, the objective being to detect long pending cases, as also to find out malpractices, misdemeanours, exercise or non-exercise of power for improper or corrupt purposes, etc.

The employees who are convicted in a Court of law for misconduct, cheating, misappropriation, etc and who are removed from service as a result of departmental proceedings should be debarred from future employment under the Government, the Commission recommended.

Observing that those Depts which are exposed more to public dealings as well as those concerned with issue of licenses, etc should be subjected to active vigil as the public are generally put to great hardship due to corrupt practices and delay is created mostly by these Depts, Commission pointed out that the Heads of Departments of Education (S), Health Services, PWD, Revenue, DRDA, Veterinary and Animal Husbandry, Power, Rural Development & Panchayati Raj, Social Welfare and District Council need to exercise constant and continuous vigilance.

Taking cognisance of the fact that it has not been possible to check-up cases of disproportionate assets against Govt employees suspected to be indulging in corruption and amassing wealth because most of the employees successfully avoid submission of annual property returns for the several years, the Commission report said that this has to be checked and the system of annual property returns strictly enforced.

Action should be taken under the provisions of FR 56 (i) for screening of all officers above the age of 50 years or those who have completed 20 years of service to weed out officials lacking in integrity.

It is necessary to conduct surprise check on offices, on works undertaken, on purchase and such other matters.

The head of Dept should drawn up detailed guidelines for this purpose.

The need for concurrent checks, especially in Engineering Depts exists.

In large number of cases payments in excess of work done were found to have been made.

So, a system of concurrent evaluation has to be introduced in all Engineering Departments.

In this regard, the Commission suggested that the Superintending Surveyor of Works in all Engineering Depts be made responsible for such concurrent checks, copies of all supply orders and work orders above Rs 5 lakhs be endorsed to the Vigilance Commission, the Chief Technical Examiner in the Vigilance Commission will examine selected cases and submit a quarterly report to the Vigilance Commission and to the Head of the Dept concerned.

Last but not the least, the Commission suggested that the Vigilance Commission will carry out random checks through the Chief Technical Examiner in above 10 percent of such cases.

As for the recommendation of setting up Vigilance Cells in the sensitive depts, the annual report explained that this would mean that some of the staff have to be provided to the Vigilance Officer to cope with the work load.

While observing that every Govt office has some posts which deal substantially with the public and which present opportunities for corruption, the Commission said such posts are easily identifiable in each organisation and it is necessary to ensure that the staff is not employed in such posts beyond the term of 3 years except with the approval of the higher authorities.

A large number of enquiries taken up by the Commission's field staff relate to complaints against individuals obtaining Govt jobs on false pretext particularly on the basis of false degrees certificates.

This amounts to cheating and is punishable under the Indian Penal Code.

It is seen that sometimes, when the culprits get caught, they submit their resignation which is accepted by the Appointing Authority.

This is not enough.

The culprits should be tried in an appropriate court of law for the offence committed by them.

Once the guilt is proved, he should be invariably be debarred from future Govt service, the recommendation said.

As to the cases of food grains lifted from godowns of the FCS or FCI and the quantity earmarked for distribution/sale in the inter iors areas being sold out elsewhere, the Commission noted that such malpractices have been possible due to lack of a proper monitoring system.

In view of this, the Commission feels that the procedure for issue of rice from the godowns for places which are in the interior areas needs to be reviewed and setting up of Vigilance Units in the Districts will help in detecting such cases and punishing the offenders.

Comment