Gfiles August 2016

GOVERNANCE NO NEED FOR CHANGE IN FINANCIAL YEAR p18
STATE SCAN SIMHASTHA EXPENSE EXCEEDS 5000 CRORE p24

August 5, 2016 `
VOL. 10, ISSUE 5
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Prabhat Kumar on paradigm shift in civil services

MG Devasahyam on the IAS, swansong or resurgence?
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From the Editor
vol. 10, ISSUE 5 | AUGUST 2016

Anil Tyagi | editor
TR Ramachandran | executive editor
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OME August 15, 2016, we will celebrate 70 years of Independent India.

India has travelled a long way socially, economically and politically. Its time
for introspection. What should be the roadmap for a new vibrant India? What
is the apparatus on hand for such a voyage? India desires impeccable, hardworking, and result-oriented civil servants. The file pushers epoch has disappeared.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has started experimenting in assigning posts to the
civil servant in a non-traditional way. This has generated uproar even among the
senior-most civil servants. gfiles cover story, Melting the Steel Frame, analyses
what is happening in Indias civil services. MG Devasahayam explains why it was
formed and how Sardar Patel believed its need, In April 1948, Sardar Patel wrote
to Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru advocating the formation of independent civil
service in the functioning of which political considerations, either in its recruitment or in its discipline and control, are reduced to the minimum, if not eliminated
altogether. This was strongly opposed by the Chief Ministers and many members
of the Constituent Assembly. Speaking to the Assembly in October 1949, the Sardar
said: You will not have a united India if you do not have a good All India Services
which has independence to speak out its adviceif you do not adopt this course,
then do not follow the present system, substitute something else. K Subramaniam
writes about the adaptability of the system, The most amazing story of the steel
frame was the demolition of inspector raj. The IAS cut down on its own powers by
doing away with the bureaucratic network that had became a hindrance to growth,
enabling India to enter into the liberalised and globalised world.
Former Cabinet Secretary Prabhat Kumar explains, The latest discontent of a
large section of officers in the Central ministries is that the bureaucracy has largely
been rendered redundant in the present regime. There is hardly any worthwhile
work being handled in the ministries. Ministers are scared of taking initiative, lest
it may be resented by the PMO. The decisions are handed down from the PMO and
are expected to be religiously followed by the rank and file. The situation is
serious. Is this a churning aimed at ameliorating the condition of Indians or is it
being done to deal with the burden gifted to Modi by the Congress.
One has to understand the new political dynamics. India is habituated to rule
by a set of civil servants. The BJP and Modi both have to prove to India that the
new dispensation is for change and perform. Modi cant be expected to behave like
his predecessors otherwise the people of India will wonder why they elected Modi.
Transformation is the name of the game, which is what Modi is doing. He is
shedding, pruning the accumulated burden of years. Should this be a reason for
discontentment among civil servants? Prabhat Kumar writes, The emerging
prototype of decision making may not be palatable to many senior bureaucrats. But
modalities and procedures, in my view, should not be allowed to override outcomes
as the ultimate test of the effectiveness of the government. It will be erroneous to
blame the PMO of upsetting the procedural integrity of the Westminster system of
governance if the new mode of decision-making serves the overarching objective of
development and welfare of people. Well said. Happy Independence Day.
ANIL TYAGI
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gfiles inside the government
vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016
CONTENTS
LETTERS
editor@gfilesindia.com
5 Bric-a-Brac
sumitra leads the way, deals in

haryana, akbar gets to work, gadkari
in america
having a judicious mix of the existing

first past the post system and a listbased proportional representation. This
would facilitate better representation in
our democracy. Electoral reforms and
holding political parties accountable is
key to maintaining a vibrant democracy
and should definitely be on the agenda.
S Rao via blog
8 Cover Story
PDVVLYHUHSDWULDWLRQRIRIFHUV
11 tough times for civil services
14 need for catalysts
18 Governance
ZK\FKDQJHWKHQDQFLDO\HDU"
20 towards sustainable agriculture
Flying high
24 State Scan
simhastha scam in madhya pradesh
35 Talk Time
catching up with bahuguna of

chipko fame
40 Comment
Realty reality
revisiting the mahatmas death
The existence of the land mafia is well

known to all (Dhesi under a cloud,
gfiles, July 2016). And nowhere is this
more evident or talked about than in
Haryana. The real estate mafia holds
sway over the government, or if the
gfiles story is to be believed till Khattar
took charge as Chief Minister. During
Hoodas time, rules and regulations
were openly flouted to benefit the big
real estate majors. As agricultural land
gets converted into buildings and
colonies, the losers are the poor
farmers who have nowhere to go. Their
pleas are not heard. It is about time
something is done about this, and I am
glad to see gfiles raising this issue and
bringing it to the notice of the powers
that be.
PK Yadav via blog
42 Book Extract
vp singh as prime minister
50 Stock Doctor
stay for the long run
52 Perspective
devotion is key
61 By the Way
haryana turns 50, dipp website

outdated, reputation counts,
zipping civil servants
Electoral integrity
I agree with MG Devasahayam (Indian
democracys underbelly, gfiles, July
2016) that party politics has drowned
good governance in our country. The
Election Commission has the power for
about two months to control the
parties. The Election Commission
should have power throughout and not
just at the time of elections. Also, it is
time we look at the possibility of

The Modi governments integrated Civil

Aviation Policy has the potential to be a
gamechanger not just for the airline
industrys revival and growth but also
for the government in terms of policymaking process and orientation (Better
late than never, gfiles, July 2016).
Sustained engagement with stakeholders
and a win-win policy orientation can be
adopted for other sectors too. The crux
of the policy is the dove-tailing of
industry growth with passenger benefits.
Though the low-cost airlines played a
major role in making flying affordable for
the upper middle and middle classes,
the growth and expansion in number of
tickets sold has not been substantial
and sustained. One such initiative is the
Regional Connectivity Scheme. Similarly,
diluting the norms for airline companies
to fly on international routes would
mean more frequent flights and possibly
at competitive prices. It is hoped that
this will give the much need boost to
connectivity and a fillip to the sector.
Kothari via email
The new civil aviation policy is aimed at
taking flying to the masses. The policy
will make it simpler for new domestic
airline companies to start flying
international routes, will make shortspan travel cheaper, focus on improving
regional connectivity, develop chopper
and charter operations, and lots more.
This was a long-awaited policy and it
seems to be in the right direction.
S Kuruvilla via blog

www.gfilesindia.com
Bric-a-brac
wheelers & dealers
Might of the Speaker

saving the lake
OK Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan is a low-profile

le
politician and takes every step with caution. She is very
emotional and possessive about her constituency, Indore,
and does every possible thing to keep her voters in good
d
humour. She recently led an unprecedented campaign, albeit
indirectly, to pressurise the BJP Government in Madhya
ya Pradesh to
cancel allotment of a district court building inside an old
ld lake. The
100-year-old Piplyahana Lake had fallen prey to encroachments
achments and
almost disappeared. The MP government had long ago allotted the dry
land of the lake bed for building the court building. Thee decision was
challenged in the NGT but the petition was dismissed on technical
grounds in March this year. That led to a public agitation with
ith all
ll political
liti l
parties and NGOs coming together to stall the construction. Mahajan, an
eight-time MP, did not join the agitation overtly but wrote to Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan twice, met him
and convinced him to save the lake. Incidentally, the Pipalyahana Lake is not a drinking water source. Saving a water
resource and saving a lake for its environmental benefits are two different things. She also convened an all-party
meeting to appeal to the State government to change the site of the court building. The government conceded and
rushed the Chief Secretary to scout for alternate land. That is called the power of the Speaker.
Making deals in Haryana

amit shah calls khattar
HE moment
ent any politician from whichever
political party
arty takes over as Chief Minister
of Haryana,
a, the very next day the
wheeler dealers start their work and everybody
in Chandigarh iss soon aware of who can get
the work done for
or a price. The current Chief
Minister, Manohar
har Lal Khattar, appears to be
an exception butt not his government. There is
possibly no one who can claim that he/she has
negotiated a deal
al with Khattar till now. But,
senior BJP functionaries
tionaries are whispering that
there is a big facilitator
cilitator operating from Chandigarh.
He belongs to Uttar Pradesh. Earlier, he
was close to former
mer Chief Minister
i. Sources
of UP, Mayawati.
disclosed that the
he builder
www.indianbuzz.com
lobby is being traumatised by tthe facilitator to

cough up the desired money to run the party
at the Centre and State. It iis learnt that this
facilitator is being patronised
patronise by a powerful
minister of Haryana. The n
news has already
spread in BJP headquarter
headquarters and party
president Amit Shah is aware
of the
aw
notorious deal broker. No wonder,
Manohar Lal Khattar and tthe powerful
minister were suddenly sum
summoned in the
last week of July by Shah.
Shah What
transpired is yet to be disclosed.
Why the hone
honest BJP
leadership is not able to
expose tthe facilitator is
still an enigma.

MJ digs into the files

from counter-terrorism to arms purchases
VERYBODY knows Mobashar Jawad MJ Akbar as a journalist,

but now he is Minister of State for External Affairs in the Narendra
Modi Cabinet. MJ not only writes well but has an impeccable
understanding of the media world and politics. If anybody desires to
know MJ well, he must read his novel Blood Brothers. The story
starts with the life of the MJs grandfather Prayaag, who is saved and
adopted by a Muslim family, converts to Islam and takes on the name
of Rahmatullah. Its a wonderful story about his grandfather who travels
to Talinpada, a jute mill colony in Calcutta. MJ has not forgotten his
painful past and has those memories with him. Thats why, possibly, he has
named his son Prayaag. Apart from powerful writing skills, MJ knows the importance
of political timings. In 1989, MJ was the spokesperson of the Congress Party. Rajiv Gandhi brought him to the Lok
Sabha from Kishan Ganj, Bihar. MJ has travelled a long political journey and he has recently become Rajya Sabha
Member from Madhya Pradesh. What is he doing in the Ministry of External Affairs? It learnt that MJ appears to be
eager to promote Make in India programme in the defence sector. Sources disclosed that he is diligently digging out
all files on counter terrorism in South Block. Afterall, terrorism has direct links with arms and ammunition and the
Defence Ministry is not purchasing arms as desired by the arms lobby. MJ never does anything without reason. He is
backed by a very powerful minister in the cabinet and a young prominent industrialist of Mumbai. The industrialist
has just entered into defence manufacturing, import and export. From a journalist to minister appears to be a
splendid journey but one has to serve his masters and, no doubt, that is tougher than writing a story.
Gadkari in the US
networking for greater benefits
ODI Cabinets senior minister Nitin Gadkari is walking in hiss boss

Modis footsteps now. He was in the US for a week in July; he
first reached Washington, where he took part in a conference
ce with
prominent think-tank members of Americas infrastructure sector
ector
for the Atlantic Council. The same day, he took part in a
roundtable conference of the US India Business Council, and
then met with Anthony Fox, US Secretary of Transportation. He
went to New York on July 13. There he met with investors in
n
meetings organised by Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan. Afterr the
meeting ended, he walked to Times Square with his NRI friend,
nd,
where he reportedly shopped a lot and bought sugar-free
chocolates for himself. Both of them landed at Indian
restaurant, Accent, thereafter; the restaurant is owned by
Anand Mahindra and Rohit Khattar and is known in New
York for its Indian dishes. Later in the evening, Gadkari
had to attend a dinner hosted by the Indo-American
Chamber of Commerce. Now Gadkari has to brief Modi on how
ow
his US visit has benefitted India.


www.gfilesindia.com
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COVER STORY
civil services challenges
Melting the
A major blow to the IAS came with massive repatriation of officers back to their
cadres. The system that had been developed and fine-tuned since
Independence was shattered
by K SUBRAMANIAM
NDIAS essential feature of democratic set-up includes a permanent

bureaucracy which has come to
be known as the Steel Frame. This
Steel Frame is essentially a colonial bureaucratic set up of Imperial
Civil Service (ICS), later renamed
as Indian Administrative Service.
The elite group of bureaucracy that
was ICS transformed into the Indian
Administrative Service with a change
in mandate aimed at development of
the nascent nation. Later, the continuity of permanent bureaucracy helped
the democratically elected political
governments in continuing the devel-
opment agenda and taking the struggling nation to self-reliance and selfsustenance in many fields. The role
of the permanent bureaucracy was so
critical that in States where political
governments changed quickly within
five years, it enabled continuity in
the development agenda and ensured
rule of law. Yet the IAS changed with
changing times...
The initial changes happened during the Nehruvian era when the colonial bureaucracy turned into a development bureaucracy. Then came the
greatest changethe diminishing of
the powers of the collector, for which,
in a way, he himself was responsible,
following the abolishment of land
revenue during the Indira Gandhi

era. The further abolition of zamindari and land ceiling were policies
implemented by the IAS which actually broke the colonial mindset about
the Collector among people. The IAS
were the first to show the bigwigs of
the land their place in the democratic
setup of India. The Steel Frame was
established. The IAS had a unique
framework, starting from the quasijudicial role of BDO tehsildaar on land
matters to magisterial role as SubDivisional and District Magistrates.
The wealth of the rich experience so
gathered was unparalleled.
The IAS also gained experience of
reality at the grassrootsexperience

www.gfilesindia.com
Steel Frame
of democracy from village panchayat

secretary to village headman and the
basic aspirations of rural India and
growing urban India. The IAS saw
democratic leadership evolving from
its rootsthe leadership that influences elections, democratic issues
that shape political parties and working pattern of a political party. The
IAS is the only service which conducts elections and observes them.
The Steel Frame thus enabled sustenance of electoral systems, understanding of political systems and
democratic leadership and democracy itself. IAS, thus, are at ease while
interacting with political leaders at
the grassrootsthe MLAs, the MPs
the State ministersand later, when
they move to the central government,
with Parliament members and Union
ministers. The Steel Frame is also the
backbone of any Prime Minister and
www.indianbuzz.com
The IAS had the most

unique framework, starting
from the quasi-judicial
role of BDO tehsildaar
on land matters to
magisterial role as SubDivisional and District
Magistrates. The wealth
of rich experience so
gathered was unparalleled
Chief Minister.
The most amazing story of the
Steel Frame was the demolition of
inspector raj during the days of liberalisation. The IAS cut down on its
own powers by doing away with the
policy and bureaucratic network that
had became a hindrance to liberalised
growth, enabling India to enter into
the liberalised and globalised world.
UCH was the Steel Frame before

May 2014. Things changed after
this. As soon as the new government took reins, the bureaucracy was
reshuffled. And, the IAS was the only
service to bear the reversal. Normally,
the IAS, as a service, is immune to
political transfers in the State and it
stands up to the rule of law mostly
by not acceding to political diktats
that are opposed to Constitution
and its tenets. The major blow to the
IAS came not because of reshuffle of
Secretaries, Additional Secretaries
and Joint Secretaries in various ministries. It came with massive repatriation of officers back to their cadres.
The system that had been developed
and fine-tuned since Independence
was shattered.
On whim, IAS officers posted
with the Government of India were
sent back. This came as a jolt since

COVER STORY
repatriation is a sort of punishment

for any officer. This became a norm
after May 2014. To cite two examples,
an IAS Joint Secretary in Shastri
Bhawan was repatriated after a
complaint of sexual harassment,
without enquiry. An enquiry later
proved that the complaint was false.
But the damage was done to the
officer, who was virtually debarred for
next five years. Similarly, an IAS Joint
Secretary in a powerful authority of
the Urban Development Ministry was
sent back to his cadre for standing up
to land sharks. The officer was the
only one of the repatriated officers to
appeal in CAT, but got no relief. In all,
60 officers were repatriated. This had
a major impact on IAS, not because
the insincere were repatriated but
because the repatriation was on
flimsy and ridiculous grounds.
The tenure system in the
Government of India gives stability
during postings and helps in
specialisation of IAS at secretariat
level. The present uncertainty has
10
The present uncertainty

has made brilliant officers,
who wanted to serve the
Government of India, pull
back and DoPT ended up
with few or no IAS officers
to serve at the Centre
made brilliant officers, who wanted
to serve the Government of India, pull
back and DoPT ended up with few or
no IAS officers to serve at the Centre.
This made the Government of India to
pull in central services, which have no
experience or idea of the departments
they were posted as Joint Secretaries.
Every third officer as Joint Secretary
in 305 Joint Secretary posts in
the core ministries is not an IAS,
but belonging to central services.
Among all the 398 Joint Secretaries
and equivalent posts, IAS officers
comprise only 60 per cent. This has
started impacting the performance
of the new government. Men with
little idea about policy and no field

experience were asked to serve,
placing further stress on Secretaries.
HE Steel Frame, which was

already reeling under the pressure of RTI, CVC, courts, CBI and
CAG and with no support for the honest and upright officers under law, has
started melting. The lack of understanding of how the Government of
India works has made the new government of 2014 reshuffle IAS like
pack of cards every month.
The Steel Frame that withstood
knocks under every regime in the
Government of India and States,
has now stated to wilt under the
onslaught of the current regime at the
Centre. Instead of protecting officers
with integrity, regular updates of AIS
service rules are making them vulnerable. When the Steel Frame melts, it
could only be hoped that it does not
impact democracy and federalism,
both of which are currently under
severe stress. g

www.gfilesindia.com
COVER STORY
prabhat kumar
Unusual times for

civil services
Instead of thinking about how to get its prime social position back, the
civil service officers should focus on how to serve the people more
honestly, efficiently and sensitively
F late, a number of civil servants

in central ministries are feeling
dispirited because of the allegedly overbearing attitude of the Prime
Ministers Office not according them
the importance they had enjoyed in
the previous dispensation. They say
that the constitutional and statutory
systems have been given a go by in
the present regime. Institutions are
not required to perform their time
honoured function and there is virtually nothing left for the many ministry
officials to do except wait for directions from the PMO, which seems to
be micromanaging everything.
The latest discontent of a large section of officers in the Central ministries is that the bureaucracy has largely been rendered redundant in the
present regime. There is hardly any
worthwhile work being handled in the
ministries. Ministers are scared of
taking initiative, lest it may be resented by the PMO. The decisions are
handed down from the PMO to be
religiously followed by the rank and
file of the government. Joint secretaries, who have traditionally been
regarded as the pivotal link in the
decision chain, have been reduced to
being mere desk officers. They come
to the office punctually (owing to the
biometric attendance recording system), but have very little to do except
drinking coffee and gossiping.
www.indianbuzz.com
It will be erroneous to
blame the PMO of
upsetting the procedural
integrity of Westminster
system of governance if the
new mode of decision
making serves the
overarching objective
of development and
welfare of people
Resultantly, All India Service officers
have stopped making a beeline to the
Centre at every level.
They quote that the Appointments
Committee of the Cabinet no longer
deliberates on high level appointments as each assignment is decided

by the Prime Minister, whose decision
is post-facto communicated to the
other members of the Committee.
According to them, the traditional
system of cabinet proposals being formulated with the approval of the minister has been replaced by prior concurrence of the PMO in important
policy matters. Even the Committee
of Secretaries has lost its deliberative
effectiveness to a great extent.
The national association of a higher
civil service recently submitted a representation to the Prime Minister,
saying that the promotion of their
members was being unduly delayed

11
COVER STORY
despite there being vacancies. They

also made a strange demandtheir
administration should be taken out of
the purview of the ministry since
theirs was an autonomous service. It
is learnt that a mutually acceptable
settlement has since been reached
with them.
For the first time in several decades, the officers of All India Services
were not too keen to come on deputation to the Government of India,
unlike the past when they used to pull
out all stops for every joint secretarys
post. We are witnessing a new practice of joint secretaries and additional
secretaries being routinely shifted
from one ministry to the other in the
middle of their stipulated tenures.
T is learnt that the government is

coming out with a 15-year vision
document in the next couple of
weeks (perhaps coinciding with the
Independence Day), based on which
the strategy for countrys future development will be shaped. Bureaucrats
in several ministries say that they are
totally in the dark about the unfolding
vision, which is being worked out in
Niti Aayog.
Is something unusual happening to
the Central bureaucracy? Was the
bureaucracy more comfortable during UPA regime than in the present
NDA regime?
Senior leaders of the opposition
allege that the PM is running a de
facto presidential form of government and that all powers are concentrated in one office with ministers
reduced to the size of postage stamps.
On the flip side is the argument
that it is imperative to have a strong
Prime Ministers Office for ensuring
cohesive and composite decision
making process for effective and
accountable governance. Also, when
there are gigantic problems on all
12
The national association of

a higher civil service
recently submitted a
representation to the Prime
Minister, saying that the
promotion of their
members was being unduly
delayed despite there
being vacancies
fronts, it is better to deal with them
through a powerful entity capable of
ensuring steadfast, unfaltering compliance. This has been adequately
demonstrated by the astounding performance of Prime Ministers MUDRA
Yojana in a very short time.
It is true that multi-level hierarchical decision making, modeled to maximise the total output of the government, has almost disappeared. It has
been replaced by an integrated decision making process. We are not making any value judgment because it is
yet to be decided which is better for

the people and the country. In fact, it
is argued that when the government
has become more focused, it is
accused of being dictatorial and arbitrary. The nation was craving for
action after ten years of policy stagnation and fragmented coalition decision-making. The emerging prototype
of decision making introduced by
Prime Minister Narendra Modi may
not be palatable to many of our senior
bureaucrats. But modalities and
procedures, in my view, should not
be allowed to override outcomes as
the ultimate test of the effectiveness
of the government. I think it will
be erroneous to blame the PMO of
upsetting the procedural integrity of
Westminster system of governance if
the new mode of decision making
serves the overarching objective of
development and welfare of people.
Should these issues impacting on
the role of the civil service be debated
within the bureaucracy, think tanks

www.gfilesindia.com
tion is discernible in the senior ranks

of the civil service. Some of its members are deliberating on why citizens
show a total disappointment with civil
servants. A thinking senior officer
says, The service as a whole must
redeem itself. As far as brilliance is
concerned, the service is replete with
it. Those who are entering now are
extremely talented, well informed
and supremely exposed to the changes
all around. According to another,
We have to get our act together
highlighting good work of fellow
officers; we also need to introspect,
seriously whether we are making
compromises to get assignments while
in service and for assignments after
service? Does it not make our position
very weak?
and in academic circles? Should the

civil servants utilise this interregnum
of tranquillity to look inside and
reflect on their future role?
The civil servants should ask themselves as to what bothers them most;
what are their priorities in life and
work. In what I have seen during my
time in bureaucracy, the universe of a
typical civil servant generally revolves
round his career and his family with
not as much awareness of the people
he is supposed to serve. Why has he
not been posted to a coveted position
like some of his batchmates; what is
the political clout of his junior colleague to be sent abroad for training
or on a foreign posting; why is he
being victimised for a minor error
while big fish are not touched, etc?
Later in the service, he flies into rage
if he is not empanelled, or if he is
overlooked for an important assignment despite his perfect entitlement
for it. And, finally, when he completes
his stipulated innings with the gov-
www.indianbuzz.com
ernment, he complains about not

being rewarded with a post-retirement sinecure job like membership
of UPSC or Election Commission.
Added to these grievances is the
panicky feeling that other services
may be gaining on his service or his
service being discriminated against
by the government.
And who is the government?
According to our civil servant, the
government is something distant and
impersonal that decides everything,
including his fate. In fact, it dawned
upon me for the first time when I
became a Joint Secretary that I was
also a part of the government.
I have said elsewhere that my
generation of civil services committed
several mistakes in the past. And the
same mistakes are being repeated by
successive generations. The civil
service has never paused to reflect
on these mistakes and the ways to
correct them.
Of late, a slow process of introspec-
NSTEAD of thinking about how to

get our prime social position back,
we should focus on how to serve the
people more honestly, efficiently and
sensitively. We should be thinking on
how to introduce more ethical content
in our day-to-day working. Leaders in
bureaucracy should think big; bigger
than themselves, bigger than clans
and factions.
Band aids will not suffice to
enhance the face of civil service in the
eyes of the people who are the final
arbiter of the worth of civil service.
Needless to say, if the service does not
satisfy the people, it should be
overhauled or changed. Fortunately,
things have not yet gone out of
hand. The Indian civil service can still
be reclaimed.
Endpoint: Introspection is essential, but we should enter the hall of
introspection leaving our egos at the
door. Regrettably, we are not made
that way. g
The writer was the Cabinet Secretary and
the first Governor of Jharkhand. He can be
reached at pkumar1511@hotmail.com

13
COVER STORY
mg
civildevasahayam
services challenges
The IAS Dilemma
To be or not to be!
For reforming a system or institution, you need catalysts with close synergy.
But, certainly not the ivy-league foreign universities or aid agencies that have
no knowledge of Indias roots and ethos
NDIA is commemorating the

silver jubilee of the LiberalisationPrivatisation-Globalisation (LPG)
reforms that commenced in July
of 1991. On this occasion, the most
telling comment comes from Deepak
Nayyar, former Chief Economic
Advisor and Delhi University Vicechancellor: At this juncture, 25 years
later, it must be stressed that reforms
are means, not ends. The essential
objective is the well-being of our
people. In this quest, markets and
governments are complements, not
substitutes. There are many things
that only markets can and should do.
However, there are some things that
only governments can and must do.
If governments perform these tasks
badly, it is not possible to dispense
with governments and replace them
with markets. Governments must
be made to perform better. Indeed,
HIFLHQW PDUNHWV QHHG HIIHFWLYH
governments. (The Hindu, July
25, 2006)
These governments at the central,
state and district levels are run by civil
servants mostly belonging to the IAS
and not politicians, armed forces or
foreign service mandarins. Therefore,
it is absurd for worthies like former
Army Deputy Chief, Lt Gen Satish
Nambiar, an hired-hand for the
Sri Lankan Army in its genocide of
Tamils, to suggest that IAS is one
14
service which is dispensable. While

the armed forces, foreign service and
many others are absolutely necessary
for nation-building, this (IAS) is one
without which the country would
certainly not come to a standstill.
6XFKQDLYHW\RQO\UHHFWVWKHOHYHORI
ignorance of his ilk about India and
its governance.
Governments are not effective
because the political system, upper
echelons of armed forces and civil
service are decaying fast. Writing with
reference to the IAS in the March 2011
issue of JOHV I had raised a poser
whether there is hope for the services
to survive and had responded thus:
Yes, if civil servants revert back to the
constitutional scheme of things from
which they have drifted and reinvent
themselves to become a fearless,
LQGHSHQGHQW KRQHVW DQG HIFLHQW
entity bound by an HVSULW GH FRUSV
which is awfully absent now The
message is clear and the choice was
obviousresurgence or swansong!
Five years down the line,
with a new government in the
saddle committed to minimum
government, maximum governance,
it appears to be a swansong and not
resurgence. Because, despite the
cacophony of slogans and noises,
reforms have not touched civil

services and basic governance. In the
last two years or so, only two things
seem to have happenedthe strange
apparition of IAS probationers
VWDUWLQJ WKHLU HOG WUDLQLQJ IURP
the top (Assistant Secretaries to
the Government of India at Delhi
instead of Assistant Commissioner/
Collector in a far-off district) and
removing IAS Joint Secretaries from
the central government, replacing
them with personnel from other
Many members of the Constituent

Assembly strongly opposed an
independent civil service

www.gfilesindia.com
services. As on date, 30 per cent of

Joint Secretaries and equivalent
RIFLDOV LQ FHQWUDO JRYHUQPHQW
are from services outside the IAS.
Another disturbing information is
that over 50 IAS Joint Secretaries
have sought and obtained pre-mature
repatriation to their respective State
cadres and very few empanelled IAS
RIFHUV DUH VHHNLQJ GHSXWDWLRQ WR
the centre. Bleeding of this service
has commenced.
As if on cue, there is an orchestrated
move to ease out the IAS from the
central government and bring in
experts with domain knowledge.
In their support, proponents of this
move are quoting the observations
of Chairman of the Seventh Pay
Commission, Justice AK Mathur, and
its Member, Dr Rathin Roy: Senior
management and administrative
positions in government have evolved
considerably and are growing more
WHFKQLFDO UHTXLULQJ VSHFLF GRPDLQ
knowledge. The former is reported
to have gone a step further and stated

that the main cause of the resentment
among the services is that over a
period of time the IAS has arrogated
itself to all power of governance. Other
services, such as the IPS, are simply
left out of many senior positions,
including those that clearly fall within
their domain expertise.
Justice Mathur has a point, but the
Five years down the line,

with a new government in
the saddle committed to
minimum government,
maximum governance, it
appears to be a swansong
and not resurgence.
Because, despite the
cacophony of slogans and
noises, reforms have not
touched civil services and
basic governance
moot question is: post-LPG Reforms,

what is the needed domain expertise
for those who run the government?
,V LW WKDW RI HIFLHQW PDUNHWV ZKLFK
at best serves the corporates and a
small percentage of the population
who have the money to spend? Or,
is it basic and honest governance
delivered through effective and just
governments that could uplift the
miserable millions. If it is the former,
the IAS is certainly dispensable. Not
so, if it is the latter.
And the question again is whether
the IAS is providing the basic
governance as described above. That
is where the rationale of the service
established by the founding fathers of
the Republic comes into play. When
India became independent, Sardar
Vallabhai Patel forcefully argued for
UHWDLQLQJ WKH DGPLQLVWUDWLYH HGLFH
fashioned by the British. He probably
had in mind the prophetic words of
,QGLDV UVW *RYHUQRU *HQHUDO &5
Rajagopalachari in 1922 when he
ZDVDIUHHGRPJKWHU(OHFWLRQVDQG
corruption, injustice and the power
DQGW\UDQQ\RIZHDOWKDQGLQHIFLHQF\
of administration will make hell of life
as soon as freedom is given to us.
N April 1948, Sardar Patel wrote

to Prime Minister Jawaharlal
Nehru advocating the formation
of independent civil service in the
functioning of which political
considerations,
either
in
its
recruitment or in its discipline and
control, are reduced to the minimum,
if not eliminated altogether.
This was strongly opposed by the
Chief Ministers of the States and
many members of the Constituent
Assembly. In his speech to the
Assembly in October 1949, the Sardar
said: The Indian Union will go. You
will not have a united India if you do
not have a good All India Services
www.indianbuzz.com

15
COVER STORY
which has independence to speak out

its adviceif you do not adopt this
course, then do not follow the present
system, substitute something else.
Sardar Patel had his way and the
IAS was established to give a fair
and just administration to the country
and manage it on an even keel. To
ensure this and safeguard the civil
servants from the vicissitudes of
political convulsions, the service
was covenanted in the Constitution.
The expectation was that the liberal
educational background and sharp
intellect of the IAS entrants, valuable
grassroots experience they gain,
their wide contacts with the public
and political leadership right from
WKH VWDJH RI WKHLU UVW SRVWLQJ DQG
their variegated exposure in different
assignments will be a boon for peoplecentered policy making, conceiving
and designing development-cumwelfare
projects/
programmes
and their honest and expeditious
implementation.
India conscientiously
adopted the permanent
civil service system. But,
over a period of time, it has
descended into a spoils
system, imbibing the worst
of both. In the event, civil
servants have abdicated
their independence and
political neutrality and
have become willing pawns
in the hands of ruling
politicians
the permanent civil service system.

But, over a period of time, it has
descended into a spoils system,
imbibing the worst of both. In the
event, despite constitutional protection, civil servants have abdicated
their independence and political
neutrality and have become willing
pawns in the hands of ruling politicians. Many of them have compromised and some have become their
joint venture partners to enjoy prized
postings while in service, grab coveted post-retirement sinecures, acquire
properties and set-up benami RXWWV
to run business and corner lucrative
contracts. Serving corrupt carpetbag-
EVEN decades past, the

rationale of the Founding
Fathers in establishing the
Service stands severely eroded. Reasons are manifold: large annual
intake touching nearly 200; wild agerelaxation; tech-education replacing
liberal education; personality test
losing primacy; vagaries of valuations of answer papers in different
languages; sub-optimal calibre of
Union Public Service Commission
(UPSC) members, affecting their
evaluation skills; skullduggery in
QRPLQDWLQJ 6WDWH RIFHUV WR WKH
IAS; absence of critical exposure
of probationers in the Lal Bahadur
Shastri
National
Academy
of
Administration (LBSNAA); lack of
rigour in training imparted to new
appointees; abdication of leadership
and enforcement of strict performance
16
Sardar Patel wrote to Jawaharlal Nehru advocating formation of independent civil service
criteria by seniors; indifferent cadre

management by the Department of
Personnel & Training (DoPT); and,
the abysmal standards of education
itself. There are quite a few who openly
say that they have joined the IAS to
make money by fair means or foul.
The arrest of a freshly appointed IAS
Sub Divisional Magistrate in Bihar
for taking bribes to allow overloaded
vehicles is a case in point.
India conscientiously adopted
gers has become their PDQWUD let the

aam aadmi be damned.
Irony is that the IAS is the product of
the Founding Fathers Idea of India.
The political idea of democracy forms
part of the Objectives Resolution
moved in the Constituent Assembly
by Jawaharlal Nehru in 1948: All
power and authority of the Sovereign
Independent India, its constituent
parts and organs of government are
derived from the people. Structurally,

www.gfilesindia.com
Indias democracy was to rise storey

by storey from the foundation,
consisting of self-governing, selfVXIFLHQW DJURLQGXVWULDO XUER
rural
local
communitiesJUDP
VDEKD SDQFKD\DW VDPLWL DQG ]LOOD
SDULVKDGthat would form the base
of Vidhan Sabhas and the Lok Sabha.
These politico-economic institutions
will control and regulate the use of
natural resources for the good of the
community and the nation.
Built on this foundation, the
economic idea of development
envisages independent India as VXL
JHQHULV, a society unlike any other,
in a class of its own that would not
nation emerged. IAS is the bulwark

of this framework. Adhering to
and advancing the Idea of India,
therefore, is the UDLVRQ GrWUH of the
IAS, covenanted in the Constitution, a
rarity among nations. In this mission,
the IAS has been increasingly failing
and is now facing an existential crisis.
Removing it is not the option, but the
service requires thorough reforming.
HE cry of the nation today is for

forward looking proactive governance that can pull the nation
out of the rot of corruption and communalism that is ravaging its polity
DQGGHVWUR\LQJLWVHGLFH)RUWKLVWKH
Sardar Patel argued for retaining the administrative edifice fashioned by the British
follow the western pattern of mega

industrialisation, urbanisation and
individuation. Indias would be agrobased peoples economy that would
chart out a distinct course in economic
growth, which would be need-based,
human-scaled and balanced while
conserving nature and livelihoods.
Such a development process would
be democratic and decentralised.
It is from this Idea of India that
the governance framework for the
www.indianbuzz.com
static and sterile IAS that is administering the country should transform
itself into a vibrant, dynamic management cadre. The core principle of IAS
reform, therefore, is to bring about
this transformation so that the unimaginative, subservient and egocentric
civil servant can become an imaginative, assertive and result-oriented
manager. To make this happen, IAS
reformers should become iconoclastic
and demolish pet theories, myths and
mindsets that are not in consonance

with democratic governance and a
modern proactive civil service.
What can the government do
WR EHFRPH PRUH HIFLHQW DQG
performance oriented? It must declare
a human capital crisis that merits
immediate action among legislators
and executives alike. The crisis
cannot be solved with the current
inventory of government recruitment
and training programmes, which
were designed for an age bygone.
For some years now, through
voluntary retirement schemes, the
government has made it easy for the
most talented employees to leave at a
certain point, but has done virtually
nothing to create entry points for midcareer candidates. If any, inbreeding
and inward-looking mindsets have
taken a stronger grip over government
functioning in recent years. This is
RQH RI WKH VHULRXV DZV RI WKH FLYLO
service system in the country today.
For reforming a system or
institution, you need catalysts
with close synergy. Ordinarily, the
triumvirate that has synergywith
the IAS-UPSC that recruits, LBSNAA
that trains and DoPT that appoints
should have been the choice. But
they are unequal to the task of being
iconoclasts and we need to look
elsewhere, but not to the ivy-league
foreign universities or aid agencies
that have no knowledge of Indias
roots and ethos.
Who should take the lead?
Obviously the PMO that has coined
the slogansminimum government,
maximum governance and VDE NH
VDDWK VDE ND YLNDV. Will it take
the plunge or confine itself to mere
tinkering as Indias elite civil service
continues to decay and degenerate?
The jury is out! g
The writer is a former Army and IAS
officer. Email: deva1940@gmail.com

17
GOVERNANCE
tn pandey
Why change
WKHQDQFLDO\HDU"
The government has appointed a committee to consider a change in the
financial year but without specifying any reasons for the need to do so
NE mornings newspapers carried the news that the central

government has decided to consider a change in the present Financial
Year [April 1 to March 31] without any
demands surfacing from any quarters.
Simultaneously, an announcement
was also made about the constitution
of a four-member committee, comprising of three retired bureaucrats,
one of them being the retired Chief
Economic Advisor of the Government
of India and the Chairman of the
committee. A senior fellow at the
Centre for Policy Research is one of
the three membersthe other two
being retired Secretaries.
The Finance Ministry has not given
any terms of reference to the committee and has merely stated that it will
examine the merits and demerits of
various dates for the commencement
of the new Financial Year [FY], including the existing one, and furnish its
report by December 31, 2016. In the
announcement, there is no mention
about the problems with the existing
FY; about demands from any quarter
asking for the change; the governments difficulties with the present
FY and why it should be changed;
and, why the proposal was not placed
in public domain before constituting
the committee.
Apparently, such major decisions
cannot be taken in a snap. These need
serious deliberations and homework,
18
such as: drawing up a catalogue of

problems being faced in the present
system; a clear statement of policy
regarding the change; a theoretical
model prepared explicitly, explaining
the line of change; and, a clear exposition and enunciation of the economic,
social and political context.
In other words, before appointing a
committee, it was imperative to be
clear as to what is sought to be
achieved; what would be the impact
if the change is made; and, what
would be the public reaction to the
changes if carried out. (Assocham has
already expressed its disapproval to
any change).
None of such exercises seem to
have been carried out before constituting the committee. Also, it has
been left to the committee to work on
its own without any guidelines from
the government.
The exercise for changing the

Accounting Year (Previous Year) for
income-tax payers has been carried
out in the past on the recommendation of the LK Jha Commission
(Economic Administration Reforms
Commission, or EARC) in 1981-83.
The Commission examined the issue
relating to the Previous Year. Incometax is charged for each financial year
at the rates prescribed in the relevant
Finance Act, on the total income of
the Previous Year. The expression
Previous Year was defined in Section
3 of the IT Act. Under the then law, an
assessee was entitled to have a different Previous Year of his choice in
respect of each separate source of his
income under the same head. With
the consent of the ITO, he could also
change the Previous Year from timeto-time. The Commission felt that
such arrangement led to unnecessary
The countries which have changed their FY are:

[i]
USA
Its fiscal year before 1976 was July 1 to June 30. It changed to
October 1 to September 30 after that.
[ii]
Ireland
Shifted from FY April 1 to March 31 to calendar year January 1 to
December 31.
[iii]
Afghanistan
Has recently changed from March 21 to April 20 to
December 21 to December 20.

www.gfilesindia.com
complications and created difficulties

in cross verification of accounts.
Hence, it recommended that the
choice of Previous Year should be
restricted to the calendar year and the
official FY only.
Acting on the recommendations of
EARC, the government decided to
have a uniform Accounting Yearthe
FYfor all the taxpayers, discontinuing the Previous Year practice of
having previous years of ones choice.
In 1988, Section 3 of the IT Act, 1961,
was substituted with a new Section 3,
providing that all taxpayers will have
only FY as their Previous Year in
respect to all sources of income. Since
the Assessment Year (AY) 1988-89,
all taxpayers are required to follow
the FY [April 1 to March 31] as the
Previous Year. If an assessee does
not prepare his accounts on FY
basis, he will have to rework out
his profit or loss for income-tax
purpose on FY basis. This change created a host of transitional problems.
For example, in some cases, the
Previous Year became of 21 months;
in some, only of 9 months. It took considerable time before the things got
finally settled.
Earlier, since 1867, India was following May-April FY. It changed to
April-March FY to align it with the
British system, which was following
April-March as the FY.
Change is the law of nature. There
could be no fixity about a FY. Hence,
there could be no objection if a country changes its FY. But, it needs to be
31 30
MAY
APRIL
3
0
1
3
MARCH
JUNE
There is no mention about

the problems with the
existing FY; about
demands from any quarter
asking for the change;
and, why the proposal was
not placed in public
domain before constituting
the committee
done on valid groundsnot abruptly
on the whim and fancy of someone
in the government. A practice or system, being pursued since years, if it is
changed, causes considerable disruption. When the income-tax Accounting
Year was changed to FY, there was
considerable dislocation and the tax
department issued various circulars
to clarify the change. The FY in India
is being followed since umpteen years
There is no uniform practice in regard to FY in various countries. The position of

some countries is as under:[i]
January 1 to December 31
China, Russia & Brazil
[ii]
April 1 to March 31
India, Japan, UK and South Africa
[iii]
July 1 to June 30
Australia, Pakistan & Bangladesh
[iv]
October 1 to September 30
USA & Thailand
www.indianbuzz.com
for government accounting and by

many others. If it is changed to some
other year, the records and registers
being maintained since years will
need to be replaced by new ones. The
staff will have to be trained to acclimatise to the new FY. The income-tax
payers may have to go through once
again a spell of transitional provisions. And, that too, apparently for
no benefit.
T is becoming a past-time with the

government to make changes not
based on any rational or logical
groundsstarting from changing the
names of cities, roads and buildings
for political expediencies. The move
to change the FY is one not needed at
all as there are no complaints of any
kind about the present FY, which is
working satisfactorily since more than
a century. The exercises of this nature
cause strain on national resources
in terms of time, money and effort,
which need to be wisely employed
not withered away in unnecessary
exercises. The committee constituted
to make recommendations regarding
the change of FY is not required and
needs to be dissolved. g
The writer is former Chairman, CBDT

19
GOVERNANCE
sustainable agriculture
Indian Agriculture
Meeting the Challenge

of Climate Change
by JNL SRIVASTAVA
The Indian agriculture

system has to get ready
with effective mitigation
and adaptation
strategies without any
loss of time.
20
NE of the major achievements of the country has

been food self sufficiency
in spite of rapid population
increase, which has reached about
1.21 billion (Census 2011). The
Green Revolution Technology has
transformed the country from a food
deficit to a food self sufficient one in
recent times. During the 11th Plan
Period (2007-08 to 2012-13), the
average annual growth in agriculture
and allied sector has been 3.6 per
cent, highest during the recent decade, even though it is short of the targeted 4 per cent, which was set as the
targeted growth for 12th Five Year
Plan. The country achieved a record
level of about 265 million tonnes of
foodgrain production in 2013-14.
Side-by-side agriculture diversifica-
tion has been significant with appreciable growth in horticulture, livestock, fisheries and agroforestry. A
number of initiatives had been taken
by the government to maintain the
food and nutritional security and protect the income of the farmers.
In spite of major strides the
agriculture and allied sector has
made, it is also face-to-face with a
number of serious challenges. The
foremost is insulating agriculture
from vagaries of monsoon and
achieving stability in agriculture
production. Whereas there has been
continuous decline in the share of
agriculture and allied sector in the
GDP, from 14.6 per cent in 2009-10 to
13.9 per cent in 2012-13, which is a
normal process in economic growth,
the share of agriculture in employment
was 48.9 per cent in 2011-12 as
compared to 58.5 per cent in 200405, indicating that almost half the
population is heavily dependent on
agriculture for employment. This has
led to great disparity in urban and
rural incomes.
Over time, the size of land holdings

www.gfilesindia.com
EASYPOLICY.COM
have gradually diminished and today

about 89 per cent farmers have small
and marginal holdings, less than 2 ha
of land. In terms of productivity of
various crops, we are behind international levels. We have not reached the
potential available, as observed in the
frontline demonstrations laid by the
Agriculture Research System. Almost
67 per cent of the cultivable area, out
of about 142 million ha, remains rainfed without any assured irrigation.
Diminishing and degrading natural
resources, low water use efficiency,
overexploitation of underground
water, deteriorating soil health, erosion of fertility, intensifying micronutrient deficiency, threat to ecosystem and biodiversity are some of the
other major challenges which Indian
agriculture is facing today.
Of the above, climate change poses
the most serious and real challenge
and the Indian agriculture system has
to get ready with effective mitigation
and adaptation strategies without any
loss of time. Climate change is an
www.indianbuzz.com
The share of agriculture in

employment was 48.9 per
cent in 2011-12 as
compared to 58.5 per cent
in 2004-05, indicating
that almost half the
population is dependent
on agriculture for
employment
immediate and unprecedented threat
to
the
food
security
of
hundreds of millions of people who
depend on small-scale agriculture for
their livelihoods. The impact of
climate change is global, but
countries like India are more vulnerable in view of the high population
dependent on agriculture.
Concerned about these adverse
effects of climate change on agriculture, food security and livelihood of
people, a Consultative Group on
International Agricultural Research
(CGIAR)-IFFCO Foundation Partici-
patory Action Research for Enhancing

Climate Resilience in Agriculture
was carried out in Vaishali district
of Bihar from 2010 to 2013. The
joint action research project was a
scientific effort to bring farmers,
scientists, agricultural administrators
and farmers own organisations
together on one platform, to help local
communities to mitigate the vagaries
of climate change.
HE action research methodology

was based on active relationship
and partnership among research
scientists, farm families and their
organisations and the local extension
agencies, including line departments.
The project aimed at developing
climate smart villages, wherein all the
above
mentioned
stakeholders
contributed in developing farming
strategies to mitigate the effects of
climate change and adopt scientific
practices for sustained production at
the field level.
In the Climate Smart Village, devel-

21
GOVERNANCE
sustainable agriculture
opment of farmers organisation SelfHelp Groups (SHG) and empowering

them through variety of trainings
related to climate change and agriculture was the key starting activity.
Farmers were motivated to take
joint action to mitigate the problems
of climate change and ensure adequate
level of productivity of different crops
and sustainability of their livelihood.
The SHG members were provided
knowledge support and training so
that they could organise themselves
for using weather and climatic
services,
community
resource
management
studies
and
for
insurance cover for improving their
crop production systems. Several
other methods, like demonstrations
on their fields, were adopted to
educate farmers about the latest
technologies available in the field of
Climate Resilient Agriculture. In the
Climate Smart Village, training
focused on water resources and water
management, agro-advisory and
utilisation of wasteland, site-specific
nutrient management and scientific
cultivation of different crops, crop
diversification and introduction of
seed varieties which withstand
temperature variations.
To weather forecast and weatherbased agro-advisories was added risk
management, which included weather-based insurance and general crop
insurance. The risk management
techniques included the introduction
of insurance products specially
designed for the project area. These
products insulated farmers from significant deviation of weather parameters, mainly rainfall and temperature, impacting crop productivity.
The IFFCO Tokio General Insurance
(ITGI), in association with IFFCO
Foundation, developed insurance
product for the crops of the project
area. Meteorological data of past 30
22
years along with crop productivity

information was used to develop such
insurance products. Index-based crop
insurance floated by ITGI was very
useful for farmers of climate risk
prone area. It covered the risk of crop
failure as well as crop affected by variation in parameters of normal climate of the area. One of the most
critical activities was testing varieties
of wheat and rice, major crops in the
cropping system which could withstand the temperature variations.
Summer mungbean was specially
introduced as a cash crop which not
only gives higher income but also was
source of nutrient to subsequent
crops. Leaf Colour Charts (LCCs)
were used for balanced nitrogen
application in rice which helps to
reduce emission of green house gases
in rice Cropping System.
THER technologies tested

were: introduction of NeemCoated Urea and System of
Rice Intensification (SRI) which helps
in early, quick and healthy establishment,
reduced
plant
density,
improved soil conditions through
enrichment with organic matter and
reduced and controlled water application. It also included demonstration
of Conservation Agriculture and modern systems of agriculture extension
specially based on ICT.
Keeping in view the importance of
women in agriculture, special groups
of women farmers were formed and
Summer mungbean
was specially introduced
as a cash crop which
not only gives higher
income but also was
source of nutrient to
subsequent crops
awareness was created about Climate

Change and its effect on agriculture.
Formation of SHGs, their education and training on climate change
for its mitigation and adaptation,
weather forecast and weather based
agro-advisories for planning of cropping pattern and cultural operation,
weather-based crop insurance for risk
management, screening of crop varieties for climate change adaptation and
higher yield, crop diversification for
higher income and risk management,
natural resource management, laser
levelling for water saving, nutrient
management for less emission of
greenhouse gases, soil testing and fertiliser scheduling, on-farm and community water management effective
agriculture extension and data bank
of SHGs for calculation of economics
of crop production have yielded significant results in the climate smart
village of Vaishali district.
Awareness has been created among
the farmers about the mitigation and
adaptation strategies and farmers
have adopted various recommendations relating to soil, water and
Nutrient
Management,
Crop

www.gfilesindia.com
Insurance products, new agronomical

practices and diversification of the
agriculture. Based on the experiment
in the project, the following strategies
have been identified which need to be
adopted to successfully meet the climate change challenges:
1. A farmer-oriented approach with
major thrust on community
participation, including those
of women.
2. Major components of the climate
smart villages should include
development of farmers organisation, gender training, weather forecast and weather-based agro-advisory through media and ICT, indexbased crop insurance, screening of
crop varieties, diversification, environment friendly nutrient management, water management, agroforestry and reclamation of water
logged soil.
3. Timely information from Indian
Metrological Department, and
weather forecast and weather
based agro-advisories need to be
transmitted through affordable
communication network.
4. In view of the risk involved due to
www.indianbuzz.com
the climate change, suitable risk

management product specially
designed for the local areas need to
be introduced. General crop insurance and weather-indexed crop
insurance, which insulate farmers
from significant deviation of various parameters, are required.
5. A critical activity in climate change
adaptation/mitigation is to identify
such crop varieties which can withstand the weather variations. In
this, the Agriculture Research
Systems like ICAR can play a key
role and it has to be a major thrust
area for the research system.
6. A balanced, sustained and robust
soil water health is a must for
achieving sustained food and
nutritional security. More food has
to be produced with lesser
resources, and, in this situation,
the only way is to increase the
efficiency of production through
modern management of improved
technologies.
Emerging
technologies
like
Information
Technology (IT) and computer
application, efficient and more
accurate electronic equipment,
remote
sensing,
Geographic
Information System (GIS), Geographic Positioning System (GPS),
and superfast transport and
communication systems, along
with hybrid seeds, biotechnology,
nanotechnology, gene revolution,
laser technology, efficient microirrigation systems, conservation
agriculture, Site-Specific Nutrient
Management System, including
balanced soil and plant nutrition
and soil health management based
on soil test for macro and micronutrients tests will require major
thrust. These technologies need to
be synergised and monitored
regularly to enhance cumulative
impact of the multiple factors. The
technology integration and packaging system through participatory
on-farm trials and refinements
will need highly trained and
motivated extension workers to
assess risk, manage the risk and to
ensure healthy production base
and products.
HE National Action Plan for

climate change launched by the
Government of India includes a
National Mission for Sustainable
Agriculture which focuses on
enhancing productivity and resilience
of agriculture so as to reduce
vulnerability to extremes of weather,
long dry spells, flooding and variable
availability of moisture.
The government has also started
initiative on Climate Resilient
Agriculture through ICAR. The
adoption of the above mentioned
strategies will go a long way in
achieving the goal of National Mission
for Sustainable Agriculture. An early
move to insulate ourselves from
adverse effects of the climate change
is the need of the hour. g
The writer is former Secretary, Agriculture

23
STATE SCAN
expos madhya pradesh
Multi-billion Simhastha swindle
Putting CWG scam

to shame
Its a scam that puts CWG swindle to shame. `5,000 crore were spent on the
mega-event by the governments own admission. And, it is alleged that nearly
`3,000 crore were pocketed by a close-knit group of people close to the
government. To make matters worse, the media chooses to remain silent.
Rakesh Dixit reports.
24

www.gfilesindia.com
PHOTOS: AM FAROOQUI
The magnitude of the

sheer swindle becomes
apparent when one
compares this amount with
the budget for Simhastha
2004. The then BJPs Chief
Minister, Uma Bharti, had
allocated just `256 crore
for the Mahakumbh
IMHASTHA 2016 has turned

out to be the biggest ever government-sponsored materialistic fraud in the garb of spirituality
in India, or, perhaps, in the world.
Compared to the enormity of the
alleged corruption in the spend on the
month-long Mahakumbh that concluded on May 22 in Ujjain this year,
the Commonwealth Games (CWG)
scam that had rocked the nation six
years ago would appear a cops bribe
extorted from a two-wheeler driver
for not wearing a helmet!
By
the
governments
own
admission, it splurged over `5,000
crore of the taxpayers money on
www.indianbuzz.com
the mega event. This is the biggest

amount any government in India
State or Centralhas ever spent on a
religious event, with a view to convert
it into a government spectacle for
brazen image-building of the head.
The magnitude of the sheer
swindle becomes apparent when
one compares this amount with the
budget for Simhastha 2004. The then
BJPs Chief Minister, Uma Bharti, a
firebrand sadhvi, had allocated just
`256 crore for the Mahakumbh.
Madhya Pradeshs Home Minister
and Simhastha in-charge, Bhupendra
Singh, had said in February this year
that the budget might exceed `5,000

crore. He then admitted that the
State government had already spent
over `3,500 crore on preparation
of the mega event. Since then, the
government has not informed about
the total expenditure incurred but,
given the extravaganza that marked
the Simhastha, the amount must
have exceeded by atleast several
hundred crores.
The Congress has alleged that more
than 60 per cent of this money
roughly `3,000 crorehas been
shamelessly pocketed by a nexus
comprising of BJP politicians, RSS
men, bureaucrats, contractors, businessmen and middlemen. The preparations for the religious congregation
had begun since 2010 and potential beneficiaries had been carefully
picked up for deployment so that the
nexus remained a close-knit group.
Such a huge rip-off in the name
of celebrating Hindu spirituality was
expected to jolt the nation. However,
forget the nation, even people in
Madhya Pradesh seem resigned to

25
STATE SCAN
condone the massive fraud played by

the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government on their faith. It is not that the
States people have become inured to
the Chouhan governments corruption. In fact, a pathetic absence of peoples outrage over the Mahakumbh
scam is largely attributable to deliberate denial of in-depth information
about the inflated purchases for the
grand religious congregation to them
by the States mediabe it print,
electronic or any other source of
public broadcast.
HE so-called mainstream media

has grossly underplayed, if not
completely covered up, the
Simhastha scam. Reasons for their
insouciance to the massive loot are
not far to seek.
The State government provided
`600 crore for publicity and
advertisements for the mega event.

A substantial chunk of that money
went to newspapers, magazines,
TV channels, websites, etc., in the
form of packages. The quantum
of packages depended on size and
clouts of the publications. A senior
IAS officer, who is close confidante
of the Chief Minister, oversaw and
executed the deals between media
and the government.
In return, the government man-
The government has not

informed about the total
expenditure incurred but,
given the extravaganza
that marked the
Simhastha, the amount
must have exceeded
`5,000 crore
aged to buy good publicity for its

works despite a plethora of incidents
of poor arrangements, thefts, group
clashes among sadhus and political flip-flop related to BJP president
Amit Shahs holy bath with Dalits.
Even the deaths of seven devotees due
to uprooting of tents in a storm and
consequent mismanagement during
the Simhastha were played down. A
large section of the media showered
fulsome praise on the Chief Minister
for his promptness in reaching out to
the victims of the tragedy. Good publicity to the Chief Minister and to the
Simhastha cost the State exchequer
a whopping amount. In the bargain,
mediamen also reportedly extracted
a handsome reward in terms of free
accommodation and travel. Some of
them allegedly received cash too.
Two months have elapsed since the
scam-marred Simhastha concluded
The State BJP government managed good to buy good publicity despite poor arrangements
26

www.gfilesindia.com
www.indianbuzz.com

27
STATE SCAN
but the State media has not bothered

to carry stories of corruption which
are, by the way, not hard to dig out.
Senior reporters of two Bhopal-based
newspapers admit, off the record, that
their respective managements have
told them to give only positive stories
about the Simhastha.
Nevertheless, the media was expected to carry at least factual reporting
of the Assembly proceedings concerning the allegations of Simhastha
corruption. To their relief, the main
opposition party, the Congress,
spared mediamen the dilemma of
having to do so.
N the eve of the monsoon session, which began on July 18,

the Congress had announced
to take up the scam with a bang. As
many as 87 questions were submitted
by the opposition MLAs on the issue.
Next day, however, the acting leader
of opposition, Bala Bachchan, sought
Speaker Sitasharan Sharmas permission to suspend the house for a day
on the pretext of Guru Purnima. The
Speaker was only too glad to oblige
the Congress leader, though it was not
a holiday. While all offices functioned,
the State Assembly session was called
off. On this day, a large number
questions related to the Simhastha
were slotted to be raised.
A large number of Congress MLAs,
who had come prepared to grill the
government on Simhastha, were
shocked over their leaders meek
surrender to the government. Loud
whispers of match-fixing between the
leader of opposition and the government to avoid discussion on the scam
resonated across political corridors in
Bhopal and beyond.
Three days later, senior Congress
leader Digvijay Singh tweeted his
disappointment over the Congress
inaction. He also sent with his tweet
28
Many temporary structures fell in Ujjain following heavy rains and a hailstorm
a link of the media report that alleged

fixing between Bala Bachchan and
the government.
While the former Chief Ministers
admonition failed to jolt the Congress
MLAs into action in the Assembly,
the government lapped it up to berate
Digvijay Singh for insulting the sanctity of the State Assembly. The uproar
in the house over the tweets ensured
that no questions were asked about
the Simhastha.
The State Assemblys monsoon

session ended without the Congress
being able to force the government
to explain why it paid several hundred crores in excess to contractors
for highly inflated contracts. Neither
the media nor the opposition has
shown the willpower or inclination to
take the State government to account
for multi-billion rupee swindle in
the name of organising the biggest
Hindu festival on the planet.

www.gfilesindia.com
BJP President Amit Shah during his much-publicised holy bath with Dalits which was held after many political flip-flops
OMPARISON between the

Simhastha and CWG scams is
inescapable. CWG, organised in
New Delhi in 2010, had spawned a maze
of corrupt deals, most of them
involving inflated contracts. CWGs
chief organiser and Congress
politician Suresh Kalmadi was
accused of handing out a Rs 141crore contract to Swiss Timing for
its timing equipmentthe deal was
inflated by Rs 95 crore. The disgraced
politician was jailed after a Central
Bureau of Investigation filed a
chargesheet against him a year later.
Now, compare the magnitude of
inflated contracts that the Madhya
Pradesh government is accused of
with the one that had Kalmadi sent
to jail:
www.indianbuzz.com
z The Madhya Pradesh government

spent `180 crore in advertisements
in the USA and other countries
media to ostensibly woo NonResident Indians (NRIs), but not
a single NRI turned up for the
Mahakumbh in Ujjain.
z `60 crore paid for health kits whose
real worth was `5 crore.
z Water coolers, which were available in the market at `3,500 per
piece, were hired by the Ujjain
Municipal Corporation at the rate
of `6,500 per piece for a month. A
total of `30 lakh was spent on hiring 528 coolers for saints various
ashrams and mutts.
z A total of 90,341 toilets were shown
to have been built at the rate of
`13,000 per toilet without any
physical verification. In reality,

only 40,000 toilets were built.
Tender for the contract had notified
its value at `36 crore but the
cost escalated for payment to `117
crore. Worse, the contract was
given to a firm which had been
blacklisted in Simhastha 2004.
z Massive corruption allegedly took
place in solid waste disposal, for
which a `40-crore contact was
awarded to a dubious firm.
z A bridge on river Shipra, whose cost
was estimated initially at `5 crore,
was shown to cost the government
`15 crore.
z `10 crore were allegedly gobbled
up in the name of levelling farms
to prepare ground for the
Simhastha fair.

29
STATE SCAN
The Simhastha Kumbh was marred by thefts and group clashes among sadhus
z `93 crore were paid for construction

of a 450-bed hospital for which
contract was originally awarded for
`66 crore.
z `600 crore were spent on publicity, not only in India but all over
the world.
z At Ninora village, adjoining Ujjain,
an international conference was
organised at the cost of `127 crore.
`4 crore was spent on building a hut
where Prime Minister Narendra
Modi was supposed to stay, but he
did not go there.
z A pitcher, which is available in
market for `150, was purchased
at the rate of `750 per unit. The
government spent `7 crore on
purchasing pitchers and that too
from an auto spare parts shop!
z Breakfast plates were purchased at
30
the rate of `1,625 per plate.

z `6 crore were spent on constructing
a hotel, but `6.6 crore were spent
on repairs of another hotel with the
same number of rooms.
HESE are only 13 of the allegations

in a long chargesheet against the
Shivraj government which the
Congress had prepared ahead of the
monsoon session. State Congress
chief Arun Yadav claimed that his
partys MLAs would not let the house
function unless the government came
clean on the allegations. He demanded
a probe into the allegations by a High
Court judge. Yadav also boasted that
the Congress will expose the role
of corrupt officers who allegedly
pocketed huge money under the
patronage of their political masters
in the government. The hit list of the

opposition included Ujjain collector
Kavindra Kiyavat, who is considered
very close to the Chief Minister.
Besides, Simhastha mela chief officer
Avinash Lavania, the son-in-law of
cabinet minister Narottam Mishra,
and Ujjain Municipal Corporation
deputy commission Virendra Singh
Chouhan, nephew of the Chief
Minister have been accused of
inflated purchases. A total of a dozen
officers and half-a-dozen companies
are charged with sharing loot through
rigging prizes of various items bought
in bulk for the fair.
The Congress chargesheet against
the accused with detailed documents
of inflated purchase is in circulation
in social media. But the mainstream
media is silent. g

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GOVERNANCE
AWARDS
2016
AWARDS CATEGORIES
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
EXCEPTIONAL CONTRIBUTION AWARD
EXCELLENT CONTRIBUTION AWARD
www.glesawards.com
awards@glesindia.com
GOVERNANCE
AWARDS
2016
Saturday,
Novembber 26, 2016
www.indianbuzz.com
31
STATE SCAN
AWARDEES 2012
Armstrong Pame, IAS,

Exceptional Contribution Award
Anil Awarup, IAS,

Jyotsna Sitling, IFS,

Exceptional Contribution
Award
Ajit Balaji Joshi, IAS,

Aradhana Patnaik, IAS,

Excellent Contribution Award
S.K. Misra, IAS (Retd)

Lifetime Achievement Award
GOVERNANCE
AWARDEES 2013
32
Jayesh Ranjan, IAS,

Dalip Singh on Behalf of

Santha Sheela Nair, IAS,
Amarjit Singh, IAS,

Award
Ashwani Lohani, IRES

JS Deepak, IAS,
Satish Kumar, Advisor, DMRC

on behalf of E. Shreedharan,
Lifetime Achievement Award
Abhayanand, IPS
Award
Atul Patney, IAS

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AWARDEES 2014
Ved Marwah, IPS (Retd),

Lifetime Achievent Award
Shrikar Pardeshi, IAS,

Shahid Iqbal Chaudhary, IAS,

Award
KN Kumar, IAS,
Award
Amitabh Kumar, IRS,

Balvinder Singh, IAS,

Pratibha Singh, IFS,

Rinkesh Roy, IRS,

A
AWARDS-2016
www.glesawards.com
AWARDEES 2015
S. Vijayakumar, IAS,
Shalini Rajneesh, IAS,

Jigmet Takpa, IFS,

Award
Ajay Singhal, IRRS,

Award
Meeran Chadha Borwankar, IpS,

P.K. Deshmukh, IAS,

Rakesh Kumar Gupta, IAS,

Amulya Patnaik, IPS,

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33
STATE SCAN
GOVERNANCE
G
AWARDS
2016
RECOGNISING EXCELLENCE
IN GOVERNANCE
gles awards recognises excellence in
governance by an independent jury comprising
former bureaucrats of unmatched standing
backed by the credibility and goodwill.
The aim is to recognize people with consistent
performance of the highest standards and those who
have made a major contribution to Indian Society.
An award can work wonders on the morale of the
person getting the award and motivate him/her to work even
harder and set a positive example for others to follow.
THE JURY
Sh. Prabhat Kumar,
(Former Cabinet Secretary,
Govt. of India and
Chairman of the Jury)
Sh. Anil Razdan, Sh. Vishnu

(Former Secretary
Bhagwan,
Power)
(Former Chief
Secretary Haryana)
Sh. M B Kaushal,
(Former Secretary
Internal Security)
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FOR BRANDING OPPORTUNITIES CONTACT

Mobile: +91 99111 10385; Phone: +91 11 2874 4789
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Email: adv@glesindia.com
FOR MORE INFORMATION,
visit www.glesawards.com
34

www.gfilesindia.com
TALKTIME
environment sunderlal bahuguna
Our economic sources

have been killed
Sunderlal Bahuguna, 88
years of age, is a living
legend and an institution
in himself. He derived
international fame when
he led the Chipko
movement in
Uttarakhand. He has
won many coveted
honours in the field of
environment and
ecological conservation
while working to
preserve the forests in
the Uttarakhand
Himalayathe Padma
Vibhushan, Padma Shri,
Jamnalal Bajaj Award
and the prestigious
international Right to
Livelihood Award.
Bahuguna sat for 74
days on hunger strike
against the construction
of the Tehri dam in the
1980s. Sunil Negi spoke
to him in Dehradun.
Excerpts from the
interview:
www.indianbuzz.com

35
TALKTIME
You have given more than seven

decades of your life to environment conservation and social
service as a Gandhian. You
turned 88 last month. What
would you like to share with our
readers on this occasion?
In the 89th year of my life, I am not
keeping good health. I am bedridden
most of the time. I am really grateful,
rather, thankful to my better half,
Vimlaji, for looking after me. Also, my
son-in-law, who is a senior doctor,
has been monitoring my health. I
have been given to understand by cardiologists that two of my hearts arteries are blocked. But, due to my age,
surgery cant be done.
But, never mind, one has to leave
this world one day. But, till one is
alive, one should try hard to live for
society, environment, ecology and
peoples welfare. Even today I am
deeply bothered and concerned about
the environmental health of the
Himalaya and of Uttarakhand and its
people. I regret to say that even after
Uttarakhand became a separate state
15 years ago, peoples expectations
remain unfulfilled. The very reason
for which Uttarakhand was formed
has been defeated, despite 46 movement activists sacrificing their precious lives. Successive governments
have completely failed us. During this
period more than 30 lakh people have
migrated to cities, towns and metropolises of the country for better jobs
and health avenues. Had the governments of the state been genuinely
concerned about peoples problems,
the exodus of the youth and the local
people would not have been so huge.
Isnt it shocking that in merely 15
years more than a double-digit figure
(of people) have migrated outside
Uttarakhand as compared to the
influx during the five decades prior to
granting of separate state status.
36
But
the
government
of
Uttarakhand has been talking of
extraordinary growth rate and
sufficient per capita income as
compared to other states. Whats
your take on this?
This is absurd and ridiculous. I have
been saying it for years that pahadon
ki jawani aur paani kabhi bhi
pahadon ke kaam nahi aaya (the
youth and water of the hills has
never been of any use for the hills) and
it has finally been substantiated by
this mass exodus of youth to the
plains. The way the water of the
Ganges and its tributariesall
Its because of lack of

decentralised socioeconomic and industrial
development and antipeople policies of the
current and successive
state governments that
Uttarakhand is still the
number one state in India
in terms of massive exodus
of youth to the cities
emanating from the Uttarakhand
Himalayahas been exploited by
outsiders, either for power and
irrigation through big dams or for
other purposes, the same way the
youth of Uttarakhand have been of no
use to the state after migrating to
cities. This is very unfortunate.
You will be astonished and shocked
to learn that during the 1960s, when
Dr Longanathan had conducted the
inter-state and inter-district economic
survey in India, Tehri Garhwal was
one of the poorest districts, with its
per capita income the lowest in India.
The district of Kumaon division,
Almora, was the second poorest in the
country. Unfortunately, even today,
despite the governments tall claims

of a revolutionary change in terms of
development and per capita income
and growth, in my personal opinion
the hills of Uttarakhand are still
backward and poor as far as the issues
of unemployment, poor health
services and industrialisation are
concerned. Its because of lack of
decentralised socio-economic and
industrial development and the antipeople policies of the current and the
successive state governments that
Uttarakhand is still the number one
state in India in terms of massive
exodus of youth to the cities.
During the earlier days, the main
source of income of the hill people
was spiritual tourism. Now, since
roads have been constructed, this
source too has ended. It is extremely
surprising that in Uttarakhand the
land use per human is comparatively
much more, but poverty is still prevalent in the interior. Our economic
sources have been killed. The states
economic status is in the doldrums
despite the governments tall claims
of economic prosperity. The hills of
Uttarakhand have been dependent on
the money order economy for ages
and the same trend is continuing.
This is very disturbing. If the government of the day does not reform itself
and work on decentralised economic
development right up to the village
level, I am afraid, in the near future,
the villages will be totally bereft of
people and the very purpose for which
the Uttarakhand state came into
existence will be defeated.
Being a seasoned environmentalist and a Gandhian, what
in your view is the remedy to
this problem?
I think that the huge exodus to the
plains is extremely dangerous from
the social, economic, cultural and

www.gfilesindia.com
security points of view of Uttarakhand.

And, I keep the security aspect on top.
Its a universal fact that expansionist
China considers India as its enemy
number one, though a number of
mutual visits by the respective heads
of state of both countries are being
undertaken for normalisation of relations. Everybody knows how China
backstabbed us in 1962 after giving
the slogan of Hindi Cheeni, Bhai
Bhai. Today, China is actively constructing its army bases in neighbouring Nepal. It has even laid down hitech railway lines and roads in close
proximity to our borders, with Nepal
playing a major role in helping it.
Even the Nepalese population is
widespread in various blocks, districts and cities of Uttarakhand. China
is clearly readying itself to militarily
capture our border areas and villages
by taking the local Nepalese people
into confidence.
With our youth migrating from
border villages in search of
employment and other opportunities,
our already fragile borders are in
grave danger. Its because of this that
I had always been appealing to the
central government to formulate a
concrete policy for the Himalayan
states of the country so as to enable
not only the solid conservation of the
environment of the Himalaya, but
also to safeguard the borders of the
Himalayan states from possible
Chinese armed intrusion.
Apart from this, we will also have to
change the land use of the hills,
including the phase-wise clearance of
the pine trees from higher altitudes
on hilly terrain. Pine trees are a direct
threat to our agricultural and mountainous land, making it barren. Pine
trees make the soil acidic and, therefore, impotent for crop cultivation. All
these measures would have to be
included in the Himalayan policy
www.indianbuzz.com
structure of the government if we

actually want to protect our hill states
from onslaughts of nature and China.
In addition to this, the government
is hell bent upon constructing bigger
dams in the Himalayan states. These
dams are completely anti-environment, anti-river, anti-people and antidevelopment. In a nutshell, I would
say that formulation of a concrete
Himalayan policy with all the above
points included is the only effective
alternative that can save Uttarakhand
from further destruction.
Recently, the government of
Uttarakhand had in principle
agreed to your proposal to cut
pine trees at high altitudes in a
phased manner. It was one of
your long-pending demands.
Are you satisfied now?
Had it been so easy, I think the previous governments would have conveniently done this. Making hills bereft of
pine trees is one thing, but planning
multiple species of productive and
environmentally friendly trees in
large numbers alternatively to substantiate for the loss of pine is another
important aspect of the problem. You
cant make the forests bald at a single
go without arranging for plantation of

a huge number of good species at
high-altitude terrain. If the mountainous terrain is made completely
bereft of pine trees in a single go, or
even in a phased manner, the hills will
become bald and there will be an
imminent danger of earthquakes,
floods, landslides and other calamities. The roots of the trees not only
keep the soil together but also stop
floods and avoid huge landslides. Not
only this, but the incessant cutting of
pine trees will also create a new breed
of timber mafia who, under the guise
of making huge profits, will also cut
other useful species of productive and
environment
friendly
trees.
Uttarakhand
is,
unfortunately,
already in the grip of such mafias who
are amassing huge wealth in collaboration with politicians by way of illegal mining in various parts of the
state. As a result, the already fragile
environment of Uttarakhand is
endangered and giving birth to natural calamities of gigantic proportions.
You had always been concerned
about the environmental conservation and deforestation of
the hills. How do you look at

37
TALKTIME

a pack of cards. Tonnes of silt, coming
out of the tunnels of dams, fall straight
into the rivers, making them narrow
and hugely prone to flash floods.
the catastrophic disaster in

Kedarnath Valley in June 2013?
Can we avert such calamities in
the near future?
Nobody can control such catastrophic
disasters, nor can we predict on a definite basis as to when exactly the
calamity arrives. Yes, we can counter
it to a great extent. Today, unfortunately, under the guise of revolutionary scientific development and blind,
uncontrolled race of technological
advancements, the whole world is in
the grip of global warming, created by
huge greenhouse emissions. A vast
population in India and other countries of the world is suffering from
various respiratory disorders and diseases like asthma and other contagious abnormalities. Global warming
has not only increased the mortality
rate the world over, but has also
resulted in increased melting of
Himalayan glaciers, which is highly
dangerous. The catastrophe of 2013,
which I consider purely a man-made
one, is merely an indication of future
disasters in the offing. It was just the
tip of the iceberg. Whenever humanity
has played with nature in the guise of
anti-environmental scientific developments or advancements, nature has
slapped humanity and governments
38
The Kedarnath catastrophe

of 2013, which I consider
purely a man-made one,
is merely an indication
of future disasters in
the offing. It was just the
tip of the iceberg
with massive ecological disasters like
that in the Kedarnath valley.
The Uttarakhand Himalaya is considered an abode of gods. Here spiritual and cultural tourism should have
been majorly encouraged. But, unfortunately, the unholy nexus of capitalists, builders, contractors, politicians
and corrupt bureaucracy hasby way
of building huge dams, buildings, luxury hotels, buildings for commercial
gains and huge structures alongside
the riversplayed havoc with our
already fragile environment. We
shouldnt forget that huge dams not
only control the smooth flow of rivers,
but also lead to massive landslides
and, therefore, to flash floods. The
explosions at dam sites lead to landslides and make our hills hollow from
inside. Huge deforestation takes place.
And, when an earthquake occurs, the
hollow and weak hills come down like
Looking back into the past, do

you think the Chipko movement
was a success or a failure?
In my opinion, and also in the opinion of environmentalists the world
over, Chipko was a trendsetter which
mobilised a vast population of the
globe towards environment conservation and against deforestation. It
mobilised people and worked as a
major and effective tool that not only
made people environmentally friendly and conscious, but also led to many
struggles against felling of trees and
construction of big dams all over the
world. I can say that it did have a very
strong international presence, but
was not that effective in India.
I salute Gaura Devi, who was the
chief architect of this movement, for
her perseverance, grit, determination
and dedication to this noble cause.
Any movement which has continuity is considered a success, but the
Chipko movement definitely lacked
a sequel. Had the governments strictly followed the tips of the Chipko
movement, I am sure the hills of the
Uttarakhand Himalayas, its environment, ecology and condition of its
people would have improved manifold by now.
My two main slogans to preserve
the ecology of the hills and improve
the lot of the people were Dhaar
Einch Paani, meaning bring the
water through a hydraulic system or
other means on the hilltops, and Har
Dhaal Par Taal, meaning plant productive trees and fruit trees on the
slopes of the hills in huge numbers,
leading to all-round prosperity, progress and economic viability of the
hills, then environment and people. g

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www.indianbuzz.com

39
COMMENT
mk kaw
Who
killed
the
Mahatma?
The irony of the situation is that both the Congress
and the BJP are using the death of the Father of the
Nation as a poll issue
NE of the perennial subjects

of debate in Indias political
circles is the question: Who
killed the Mahatma? This evergreen
topic has been given a new lease
of life by the vociferous manner in
which the Heir Apparent has posed
the query, giving it a contemporary
significance. The Supreme Court
has stoked the fire further by giving
Rahul Gandhi the Hobsons options
of tendering an apology or else, facing
the consequences.
On the face of it, the answer is
simple. There is no question that the
hand that wielded the murderous
40

weapon belonged to Nathu Ram

Godse, a Chitpavan Brahmin from
Maharashtra. There were numerous
witnesses to the crime, which was
committed in public when Bapu was
proceeding towards his evening
prayer meeting at Birla Bhavan, New
Delhi. Godse surrendered to the
police and made no attempt to run
away or deny his role in the tragedy.
The real question that bothered
everyone in 1948, during the
investigation and trial that followed
and years later whenever the
allegation of a deeper conspiracy
arose is whether Godse was acting
alone in his personal capacity or if he

was only the visible tip of the iceberg.
The alleged assassins could be a group
of Hindu zealots, the Godse brothers,
the RSS, the Hindu Mahasabha or
someone else.
Godse submitted a long and
cogently argued statement of defence
to the trial court. This has had a wide
currency and there are only a few
Godse lovers who accept his
contention that there was no
conspiracy for the assassination; that
he had himself felt the iniquity in the
Mahatmas treatment of the Hindus
and had come to the conclusion that

www.gfilesindia.com
the only solution for the danger he

posed to the country was his physical
elimination from the scene. This
decision taken, he plotted secretly
and alone in procuring the weapon,
choosing the time and place and
perpetrating the crime. No one else
had collaborated with him and he
alone should be held responsible for
the crime. He gave no defence for his
act, except to allege that Gandhis
stance on various issues had been
inimical to the interests of Hindus
and he was fully prepared to face
the consequences.
Neither at that time nor since then
has Godses version met with acceptance. It is generally believed that several individuals and organisations of
the Hindu community had spread an
atmosphere of hatred against Gandhi
and Godses act should be construed
as emerging from a mindset that had
consequently emerged in a section of
Hindu youth. Many also argued that
Godse could not have successfully
carried out the assassination singlehandedly. He must have received
moral, intellectual or material support from some organisation. The
prime suspects were the RSS and the
Hindu Mahasabha.
There is evidence to show that
Nehru was intensely worried that the
assassin should not turn out to be a
Muslim. He was fearful of the
bloodbath that would ensue had that
been the case. Gandhis murder by a
Muslim could have sparked off
widespread riots between the two
major communities in the country.
It is well known that the Ministry of
Home Affairs, which was then held by
Sardar Patel, concluded that members
of the RSS had been involved in
various kinds of illegal activities and,
therefore, there was a cogent case for
banning the RSS. There are solid
reasons why the BJP Government led
www.indianbuzz.com
by Narendra Modi today would like to

own up Patel as one of its icons.
The case for the RSS is strengthened
by the fact that the Congress
government had twice set up judicial
commissions to probe the matter. On
both occasions, the commissions
absolved the RSS of any complicity in
the murder of the Mahatma.
At one level the Congress itself
cannot escape responsibility for its
failure to provide adequate security to
Bapu, despite the perceived threat to
his life. The defence that Bapu had
himself refused to accept a security
The real question that

bothered everyone in 1948,
during the investigation
and trial that followed and
years later whenever the
allegation of a deeper
conspiracy arose is
whether Godse was acting
alone in his personal
capacity or if he was only
the visible tip of the
iceberg
cover does not pass muster. Gandhi
had often placed his life in danger by
going on a fast unto death or by
initiating
a
non-violent
mass
movement on a nationwide scale,
knowing full well that it could invite
violent reprisals from the British law
and order machinery.
At another level, one can argue that
Gandhi was a great acolyte of Jesus
Christ. The Bible recounts in great
detail the story of how Jesus met with
his death. It is well known that Jesus
knew at every stage of his life what the
next step in his lifes journey was
going to be. He was aware that Judas
was going to reveal his identity to his
enemies. But he permitted Judas to

kiss him on the cheek, which led to his
arrest and trial, and subsequently to
his crucifixion on the cross. Jesus
believed that God had sent him on a
mission and that all these events,
however horrendous they appeared to
be, were an integral part of that
mission. He refused to escape,
although some of his disciples advised
him to do so. In a way it can be
said that Jesus voluntarily embraced
his death.
ANDHI was a great acolyte

of Christ. Many great saints
have lived lives in imitation
of Christ. It can be said that, at one
level, Gandhi also knew that he was
no longer in control and command
of the political scene in the country.
He was losing his relevance in the
post-independence scenario. He was
totally opposed to partition of the
country and, in fact, requested Lord
Mountbatten to end British rule and
not insist on the partition. He made
an offer to Jinnah to nominate a
Muslim League leader as the Prime
Minister of an undivided India,
but none of the Congress leaders
supported him. He could see that he
was becoming less and less significant
in national politics.
In a way, Gandhi imitated Christ.
He could see his approaching death
and he voluntarily embraced it in
order to fulfil his destiny and mission.
So, we can say that the Mahatma
murdered the Mahatma.
The irony of the situation is that
both the Congress and the BJP are
using the death of the Father of the
Nation as a poll issue. They both wish
to convince the electorate that they
are the real heirs to Bapus legacy! g
MK Kaw is a former Secretary, Government
of India. (The views expressed are those of
the columnist.)

41
BOOK EXTRACT
prime ministers vp singh
Janardan Thakur started

his career in journalism
with the nationalist
Patna
daily,
The
Searchlight, in December
1959. In his long and
distinguished career
spanning the reign of
each Prime Minister
since Independence,
Thakur reported from
the thick of some of the
most
momentous
contemporary events at home and afarJPs
total revolution, the Emergency, the bristling
emergence of Sanjay Gandhi, the fall and rise of
Indira Gandhi and then the rise and fall of Rajiv,
the Kremlin of Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev, the Soviet
invasion of Afghanistan and Khomeinis revolution
in Iran, Ronald Reagans re-election in an America
swinging Right, VP Singhs ascent as a messiah
with tainted magic and the rasping run to power
of the BJP. Thakurs journalism, from the very
start, broke traditional moulds of reportage and
writing, going beyond the story that meets the
eye and into processes and personalities that
made them happen. His stories on the Bihar
famine of the mid-1960s and the manmade floods
that ravaged the State were a sensation. He was
perhaps alone in predicting defeat for Indira
Gandhi in 1977 and again singular in exposing the
corroded innards of the Janata Government that
followed. A Jefferson Fellow at the East-West
Center, Hawaii, in 1971, Thakur moved to New
Delhi as a Special Correspondent for the Ananda
Bazar Patrika group of publications in 1976. He
went freelance in 1980 and turned syndicated
columnist. In 1989-91, he was Editor of the
fortnightly Onlooker, and The Free Press Journal.
Thakur authored All The Prime Ministers Men,
probably the most successful of the crop of books
that followed the Emergency. His All the Janata
Men, the story of the men who destroyed the first
non-Congress government in New Delhi, was
equally successful.
He passed away on July 12, 1999.
42

Raja nahi,
fakir hai
ISHWANATH Pratap Singh started his term as the

countrys Prime Minister with a splendid example
of value-based politics. The newly elected MPs of
the Janata Dal, a total of 143 in a Lok Sabha of 543 seats,
had gathered to elect their leader and the seventh Prime
Minister of India. VP Singh who had spearheaded the
onslaught against Rajiv Gandhi, with Bofors as his lethal
weapon, was generally considered the natural leader of
the new party, but he had a rival who was set on taking the
crown: Chandra Shekhar. The meeting started with VP
Singh proposing the name of Devi Lal for leadership, and
Chandra Shekhar at once seconded it. Normally this would
have created a lot of sound and fury, because most of the
Janata Dal MPs expected VP Singh to be the leader. If
there was not even a murmur at this turnabout, it was
because Singhs new friend, Arun Nehru had quietly
briefed the MPs about the drama they would stage. No
sooner had Chandra Shekhar seconded his name, Devi Lal
got up and said he was overwhelmed by the honour, but as
the elder leader he was proposing the name of VP Singh as
the leader. Before Chandra Shekhar could even understand what was happening, Ajit Singh got up and seconded
the Taus proposal. Shekhar was left high and dry. It was
an act of deceit and mendacity, the like of which the Central
Hall of Parliament had never seen before.
Deceit and mendacity were the stock-in-trade of both
VP Singh and Devi Lal whom he made his deputy. Both of
them wore masks of self-effacement; VP far more convincingly than his colleague from Haryana. I will never again
accept any other post in my life had been Singhs constant
refrain after he resigned from the Rajiv Government.
Asked why he would not accept any post, he said, It is not
laying down arms but a change in lifestyle. I do not fit in
the current situation. About his future he said, I think I
will only read and write.
He had laughed off any talk of his wanting to become the
Prime Minister by saying that if did become the PM it
would be a national disaster. Self-disparagement is often
taken as a sign of modesty and humility but as it turned out
in this case, VP Singh had been prophetic. In 11 months as
the Prime Minister, he left the country torn and divided as
never before.

www.gfilesindia.com
The circumstances in which VP Singh resigned from the

Rajiv government had suggested an imminent revolt in the
ruling party. He was still calling Rajiv Gandhi his leader
whom he would never desert. He had scoffed at the talk
of dissidence in the party and said it was just in the
papers. Even after he formed his Jan Morcha, Singh continued to act as though he would never touch the
Opposition. I will never fall into the Oppositions trap, he
told his aides. He was obviously hoping that the Congress
would crack and he would emerge as the alternative to
Rajiv Gandhi. He had started going around, addressing
meetings in various parts of UP and Bihar, but his speeches were still just abstract lectures. He had refused to
address a Kisan Union Rally in Haryana
because the organisation had opposed the
Congress government. At Gorakhpur, where
he was prevented from addressing a kisan
rally by the then chief minister, Vir Bahadur
Singh, he said, You cannot throw away a
shirt just because it has lost a button.
After his initial plan of breaking the
Congress party failed, VP Singh became
more receptive to the overtures of some
Opposition leaders who were looking for an
anchor ever since their debacle in the 1984
elections. By November end, the Jan Morcha
went back on its announced policy and joined
an alliance with the Janata Party, the Lok Dal
(A) and the Congress (S).
VP Singhs government was truly unique. It was the first
and only government in the world which was supported by
both the Left and the Right. VP Singh had returned to the
early days of his revolt against Rajiv Gandhi, when he had
marched out, sometimes going left and sometimes right.
The first to lap him up were the ayatollahs of Hindu revivalism. In Varanasi, they anointed him as Rajarshi. It was a
title introduced long back by Pandit Madan Mohan
Malaviya as the highest honour of the Sanatana Dharma.
A bit of the glory was washed when it transpired that the
Kashi Vidvat Parishad had been hijacked by some unauthorised people who conferred the title on VP Singh.
Fake or real, an obcurantist organisation had given the
first push to VP Singhs caravan. The swift bunch-up of the
Hindu forces around VP Singh was not entirely of his own
making. It had happened before to Jayaprakash Narayan
when he began his movement in the mid-1970s.
Throughout the JP movement in Bihar and Gujarat and
subsequently during the formation of the Janata Party, the
elections of March 1977, and the making of the Morarji
www.indianbuzz.com
Government, it was the Jan Sangh, with the RSS behind it,
which played the most crucial role. The merger of parties
had turned out to be enormously fruitful for the Jan Sangh,
for it could not have dreamt of winning a 100 seats in the
Lok Sabha on its own. JP had done for them what all their
Gurus put together never could.
But the dream collapsed too soon. In its new incarnation as the Bharatiya Janata Party, the organisation tried
hard to become another umbrella party like the Congress
but in the process it even lost its basic appeal. The slide had
become a rout in 1985: the BJP got just two seats in the Lok
Sabha, and all its stalwarts were defeated. It was time to
look around for a new prop, and here came the new
Messiah, cleaner than Mr. Clean. They
wasted no time in rallying round him, and
even found a slogan for VP Singh: Raja nahi
fakir hai, Bharat ki taqdeer hai! This indeed
was a case of history repeating itself, this
time as a farce!
AYAPRAKASH Narayan had also

embraced the Jan Sangh and the RSS,
but there was a world of difference
between him and the new Messiah. JP had
known too well what he would be up against.
An important reason for JPs moral stature
was that his disinterest in positions of power
was not a mere pose. He had not fought
Indira Gandhi to become the Prime Minister. It was the
opposite with VP Singh. The more he repeated that he
would never again take a post in the government, the less
he was believed. In spite of all his renunuciatory poses, it
was apparent that he was seeking power. Within three
months of saying he would not take any post, he was the
President of the Janata Dal, Convener of the National
Front and the leader of the Fronts parliamentary party,
and then the Prime Minister of India.
The RSS and the BJP were merely pushing his car.
Having got the initial push, his ever-active mind was working on another track. But he soon turned coy and diffident.
Perhaps the calculator inside him gave a warning signal:
This isnt the right way to the throne. He knew that the
rightist could take him thus far and no further. What he
needed to achieve his goal was a socialist, pro- people
image, and if a Raja could not declare himself a leftist, he
could well embrace the leftists as his natural allies. VP set
out to carve himself in the Nehruvian mould, and he even
had a Nehru of sorts to help him out. Then began his alliance with the Communists who were themselves not

43
BOOK EXTRACT
averse to making a possible stepping stone out of the Raja.

Even so, he never allowed a break in his links with the
rightists and refused to succumb to pressures of the left.
One of his principal aides right from the start was Arif
Mohammed Khan who had left Rajiv Gandhi solely as a
protest against policies meant to appease Muslim fundamentalists, and now the same elements whom Arif had
fought were being embraced by his new-found leader, VP
Singh. It was only natural for Arif to take umbrage.
All-round inconsistency has been the hallmark of
Rajrishi VP Singh. He knew that to get to his goal he would
have to change his train. Just a day before the veteran
Marxist and chief minister of West Bengal, Jyoti Basu, was
scheduled to reach Delhi, VP Singh declared that his natural allies were the left parties. He had declared he would
not have any truck with communal forces, which at once
raised the question whether he thought the RSS and the
BJP constituted such forces. That he
would reply to. There is no use calling each other names, he would say
at press conferences.
HE Raja suffered no pangs of

conscience playing this double
role. Conscience for him was
something that rose or slept according to the demands of a political situation. His refrain was that anyone
from a convict to a temple priest is
welcome to join me, if he is willing to
fight for the issues involved. And
what were the issues? Not communalism, not the return of feudal barbarism or mediaeval
obscurantism, not the anti-poor economic policies that he
had himself piloted. None of these was an issue as far as he
was concerned at that time. His only issue was corruption,
and this he was going to fight shoulder to shoulder with VC
Shukla, Chimanbhai Patel, Devi Lal and company. How
long could he go on fooling the right and the left with what
HN Bahuguna had described as his Mona Lisa stance?
VP Singh, I wrote in an earlier book, was at his communal best (or should I have said secular best?) during his
own by-election in Allahabad. He had shut up his own
aide, Arif Mohammed Khan in purdah because he had
become a persona non grata with the Muslims after his
role in the Shah Bano case, and asked Syed Shahabuddin
to campaign for him. Please come eight or ten days before
the polls, he had urged Shahabuddin. But then Singhs
RSS friends had persuaded him to keep Shahabuddin out
44

of the campaign, and so when Shahabuddin arrived in

Allahabad, he was not too welcome. All the same, he went
to some Muslim areas and did his best to mobilise support
for VP Singh. After his victory, Singh sent him a telegram
to thank him. Arif Mohammed Khan was on the warpath.
He threatened to expose the double-faced Raja. He had
said, VP Singh has won Allahabad and lost India.
Hours after VP Singh was sworn in as the Prime
Minister, he was confronted with his first major crisis.
Rubaiya Sayeed, the 23-year-old daughter of Mufti
Mohammed Sayeed whom he had made his Home
Minister, was kidnapped by a group of militants belonging
to the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front. They
demanded the release of five of their colleagues. Six days
later she was released in exchange for five militants.
This gave Rajiv Gandhi, now the leader of the Opposition,
with 197 MPs behind him, his first chance to attack his
former Finance Minister. He called it
a weak and inept government, and
accused Sayeed, who had been a
favourite of the Gandhis until not very
long back, of having links with the terrorists. The kidnapping was all a putup show, he said, only for the purpose
of helping the terrorists. Srinagar was
under curfew; Hindus families were
running away to Jammu leaving their
hearths and homes behind. There is
a civil war going on in Kashmir, said
former Congress minister and Gandhi
loyalist Makhanlal Fotedar, and the
Prime Minister does not know how to
face it. The government has compromised national security for the Home Ministers daughter and now terrorists
in Punjab as well as in Kashmir are raising more demands
because they feel the government is weak.
VP Singh yielded to pressures from the Bharatiya Janata
Party and despatched Jagmohan to Srinagar as governor.
His brief was to deal with the situation with an iron hand.
On January 19, Jagmohan took over. At midnight, there
were massive raids in downtown Habbakadal. About 400
Kashmiris, mostly youth, were dragged out of their houses
in a combing operation. Next day over 25,000 people
defied curfew at Chhanpora and Natipora, and machine
guns were used to disperse the crowd at Gowkadal. At least
60 bodies were loaded onto trucks and taken to the police
headquarters. Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah resigned in
protest against the appointment of Jagmohan, and the
assembly was dissolved. Farooq left for England and it

www.gfilesindia.com
took him very long to regain some credibility in the Valley.

After VP Singh became the Prime Minister, George
Fernandes had boasted that now that Rajiv Gandhi was
gone, the problems of Kashmir would be solved automatically. The boast now sounded like a joke. With the Valley
going out of hand, Singh had appointed a Kashmir Affairs
Committee and made Fernandes the minister in charge of
state. Confusion became worse confounded. There was
already Arun Nehru who thought he was a specialist on the
state, and now there was another minister flying in and out
of the Valley every other day, holding talks with militants
and passing all kinds of orders, raising the hackles of the
Home Minister in Delhi and the governor in Srinagar.
Fernandes and Mufti Mohammed Sayeed were often at
loggerheads. The police firing on the funeral procession of
a prominent religious and political leader, Mirwaiz Farooq,
had led to heavy casualties. Singh recalled Jagmohan and
appointed a former chief of the RAW as the governor. As a
compensation, Jagmohan was given a berth in the Rajya
Sabha, a step that came in for severe criticism. Explaining
this, VP Singh points out that the advice was given by official BG Deshmukh who was of the view that Jagmohan
should be neutralised, and not allowed to become a BJP
martyr. The approach, VP feels, worked.
HE Janata Dal was a bizarre experiment which lent

itself to much ridicule and banter, at which Rajiv
Gandhis Boswell, Mani Shankar Aiyar excelled. The
real divide, argued Aiyar, was over the conception of the
identity of our nationhood: do we want a diverse but composite, multi-religious, multi-cultural flowering of India
or do we want Hindutva? The destiny of India turns on
that question. VP Singh had won the elections chanting
the Bofors mantra, but it became one of his biggest anxieties to prove what he had been saying from city to city. He
and his men were leaking stories by the reams on the scandals of the Rajiv Raj, but everyone was asking for the conclusive evidence he had been talking about all through his
campaign. VP Singh told Parliament that we well do everything to get the names and come to the truth. The CBI
had been asked to pursue the case vigorously, the government has approached the Swedish governments to
make available the complete report of the National Audit
Bureau... The same old bromides that the people had
heard even in Rajiv Gandhis time. Everything but the
proof. The investigators, commented a journalist tired of
following the same story for months, were more buffoons
than villains; their stories owed more to cook-ups than
conspiracies, and their failures stemmed from simple
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ineptitude. More than anything else, they committed one

cardinal sin: they suspended the rules of logic and evidence and believed their own propaganda.
The one notable feature of VP Singhs 11 months in
office was the phenomenal rise of Devi Lal and Sons. In
1989, when Tau became the Deputy Prime Minister, he
handed over the reins of the state to his son Om Prakash
Chautala. When the value-based Prime Minister, VP
Singh, showed a little unhappiness about the later activities of Chautala, Devi Lal told him: You should not be
talking about political morality. You became the Prime
Minister only because I told a lie.
In order to win a lost election, Chautala had teamed up
with his son Abhay Singh to terrorise the constituency,
Meham. The police turned a blind eye. There was a virtual
bloodbath on election day. Chautala refused to step down.
At a huge Boat Club rally on his 75th birthday, Devi Lal
proclaimed himself as the Tau of the nation. But it rapidly became apparent that the nation comprised his four
sons, their wives, grandsons, and some kith and kin, said
a commentator.
When Meham became a major issue, Devi Lal resigned,
creating the first major political crisis for VP Singh. The
Prime Ministers first instinct, he told his aides, was to
accept the resignation. I should have, I should learn not
to ignore my first instinct, and if I had had any sense I
would have accepted it.
The Prime Minister perhaps realised that Devi Lai
would be a far greater threat outside the government than
within it. He joined those clamouring for his return, and
wrote a remorseful letter, declining to accept the resignation.... You have been one of the main architects in forming the Janata Dal and have greatly contributed to its success in the elections.
Sometime later, the five-member committee of the
Janata Dal which had inquired into the Meham incident
recommended that Chautala should step down from the
leadership in Haryana. Finally, after a great deal of flip-

45
BOOK EXTRACT
flop, the Prime Minister thought it was time to act and the
party directed Chautala to resign. Fifty days after his
removal, Chautala was reinstated as Chief Minister.
Nobody doubted that this was part of a deal struck between
the Prime Minister and Devi Lal.
The Prime Ministers problems started some days later
when Arun Nehru returned from a foreign trip and got into
the act. He decided that he would resign. Nehru accused
VP Singh of betraying the hopes that we raised among the
people in the course of the struggle and dealing a stinging blow to the image and credibility of the party and the
government. There was panic in the Janata Dal. I am not
claiming that I am the only moral person in this government, Arif Mohammed Khan told the press. My point is
different. When there was violence at Meham, the Prime
Minister told Parliament that the cabinet would take a
decision. The cabinet decided
to ask Chautala to resign. Now
how can you bring the same
man back in defiance of decisions reached by the cabinet
and the party high command?
Devi Lal was livid. He could
not stand these riff-raff talking about principles, he said.
In a conversation with Arun
Shourie, then editor of the
Indian Express, he had even
used four-letter words to
describe Arun Nehru.
P Singh was in a bind. The only way to survive, he

decided, was to mount a counter-attack. He used
his ultimate weapon: his own resignation. It was an
old ploy that he had used with great effect in the past. He
sat down and wrote: The rationale of my being in the
office of the Prime Minister was the trust of the people, of
the members of the National Front and of the supporting
parties. The developments during the last two days have
shown that I have lost that trust. The rationale of my continuing in office is no longer there. Bowing to the general
sentiments I wish to step down from the prime ministership...
The purpose of the letter was clear. Had VP Singh really
wanted to quit, he would have sent it to the President of
India. Instead, he sent it to the president of the Janata Dal,
his explanation being that if he had sent the resignation
directly to the Rashtrapati Bhawan it would have paved
the way for the return of the Congress. All that VP Singh
46

wanted was to give a new turn to the crisis. Party president

Bommai rushed around from leader to leader, seeking
their advice and consent. Reject the resignation, everyone
said. Suddenly neither Arun Nehru nor he was the issue:
Devi Lal was. Six ministers of state and deputy ministers
quit in the space of a few hours....All gave the same reason:
Chautala should not have been brought back.
I dont know about the rest of you, Chandra Shekhar
said during a meeting to discuss the VP Singhs resignation,
but I am sick of these two men (VP Singh and Devi Lal)
and their fights. They conspired to turn the leadership
elections into a fraud and elected a Prime Minister through
conspiracy. One has made his son a chief minister, the
other has made his damaad (son-in-law) a Rajya
Sabha MP...How long can this go on? ...Then turning to
the Prime Minister, he asked: Now, you tell me, what was
the deal? What had you and
Devi Lal agreed on? VP Singh
kept quiet. He kept looking at
the table.
The crisis deepened. More
ministers resigned, and the
government was at a standstill.
Finally, Devi Lal made his conditions known: The new chief
minister would have to be his
man; Om Prakash Chautala
would continue as the general
secretary of the Janata Dal; the
resignations of Arun Nehru
and Arif Mohammed Khan should be accepted. There were
many more demands.
After four days the whirlwind settled, but it was the
beginning of the end of the Rajas government. Devi Lal
was now determined to bring the whole edifice down.
Within days he plunged the party into a fresh crisis by levelling charges of corruption against Arun Nehru and Arif
Mohammed Khan. When the Prime Minister insisted that
he substantiate these allegations, Devi Lal sent him a
forged letter reportedly written by VP Singh to the
President of India in 1987 accusing Arun Nehru of being
involved in the Bofors deal. VP decided that the contradictions had gone beyond his control. With the backing of the
national party, VP Singh wrote to the President on the
midnight of August 1, 1990, recommending the dismissal
of the Deputy Prime Minister, Devi Lal.
Devi Lal had already announced his great offensive: a
kisan rally on August 7. But the Raja had a far more potent
weapon up his sleeve. Just two days before Devi Lais

www.gfilesindia.com
planned rally, the Prime Minister made a suo moto statement in Parliament. A momentous decision of social justice he called it. The percentage of reservation for the
socially and educationally backward classes will be 27 per
cent, and this reservation will be application to services
under the government of India and public undertakings...
HE acceptance of the Mandal Commission report,

which had been gathering dust in the entrails of the
Home Ministry for years, took the country by storm.
Violent reaction gripped some of the major cities in north
India. Students went on rampage, burning buses, attacking
government property. Some were killed in police firing in
Delhi, Gorakpur, Varanasi, Kanpur, Madhubani and
Dhanbad. In Jaipur, the Army was called out. At first
students burnt their degrees, then some got down to
burning
themselves.
Conscious of the genie he
had unleashed, the Prime
Minister declared from the
ramparts of the Red Fort: If
power in the hands of the
rulers could be compared to
a sword, it shall act against
the exploiters. It was VP
Singh in his new political
incarnation the Messiah
of the Backwards!
When Lal Krishna Advani
went to visit one of the boys
who had tried to immolate himself, he was heckled and
attacked by Delhi University students. He could see that in
one stroke VP Singh had changed the entire socio-political
dynamics of the country. It was high time that his party
came up with something to counter the VP Singh card.
Rath Yatra was the answer. Mandir against Mandal. The
BJP mind had its limitations.
After Advani launched his yatra, the Prime Minister
spoke to Atal Behari Vajpayee and asked him why they
were doing it. Vajpayee said: Aap ne Mandal kiya to hum
Kamandal kiye. Vajpayee himself had scoffed at the Rath
Yatra, but it was beyond him to stop it. The BJP was convinced that in playing the Mandal card, the Raja had
declared his election manifesto. They had to answer it with
their own manifesto: the liberation of Ram Janmabhoomi.
When VP Singh played his brilliant card, he could hardly have visualised that he would have to pay for it with his
chair, though he later claimed he did: There is a certain
price tag to everything, and you have to be prepared to pay
www.indianbuzz.com
the price. You cannot get the thing and then regret paying
the price...maal leyaao to daam dena parega. Mandal implent
kiya to uska daam bhi dena para.
Through Mandal, I knew we were going to bring in
changes in the basic nature of power. I was putting my
hand on the real structure of power. I knew I was not giving jobs, Mandal is not an employment scheme, but I was
seeking to place people in the instrument of power through
the use of governmental power... History is not changed
without an element of ruthlessness and once you have set
out on this course to make real change permanent, you
have to have an element of ruthlessness...I knew he decision would trigger off new realignments. And I was also
clear about my fate. I had visualised it.
The Prime Minister had indulged in all kinds of antics
to save his government. He had first tried for a compromise
acceptable to both sides, and
convened
an
all-party
meeting, but the BJP refused
to attend. The partys
national executive warned
the government that if the
Rath Yatra was disrupted or
attempts were made to
prevent the construction of
the Ram temple, it would
withdraw support to the
government. Caught in a
cleft stick, the VP Singh
government
issued
an
ordinance acquiring the entire disputed area in Ayodhya,
then withdrew it two days later when Muslims of the area
protested that the ordinance would affect the title suits
they were fighting in various courts. After he had run out
of all his cards, VP Singh declared on television that
he was going to stand up for secularism, regardless of
the cost to his political career. The Advani Rath was
then in Bihar, and Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav was
not going to let such an opportunity slip through his
fingers. He stopped the Rath at Samastipur and arrested
Advani. The BJP withdrew its support the same day
October 23, 1990.
VP Singh went to Rashtrapati Bhawan, not to submit
his resignation but to convince R Venkataraman that he
could still manage the contradictions. All he needed was a
little time. The President set November 7 for the 11-month
old government to prove its majority in the Lok Sabha. g
Excerpted from Prime Ministers: Nehru to Vajpayee by
Janardan Thakur, Eeshwar Prakashan, New Delhi

47
SPOTLIGHT
Prime Minister Narendra
Modi at the India-South
Africa Business Meet, in
Pretoria, South Africa. The
President of the Republic
of South Africa, Jacob
Zuma,
is also seen.
Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers

Welfare, Shobhana K Pattanayak, lighting the
lamp to launch the Feed the Future - India
Triangular Training Programme, in New Delhi.
Chief of Army Staff, General Dalbir Singh,

in a group photograph with the team
members of the Indian Army Mount
Everest Expedition 2016, in New Delhi.
Vice President and Chairman, Rajya

Sabha, M Hamid Ansari, with the newly
elected/nominated members of the
Rajya Sabha. Deputy Chairman, Rajya
Sabha, PJ Kurien, is also seen.
48


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PHOTOS: PIB
Vice President and Chairman, Rajya Sabha,

M Hamid Ansari, with the newly elected Rajya Sabha
Members, Oscar Fernandes, Jairam Ramesh, MJ Akbar
and SC Misra, at the swearing-in ceremony at
Parliament House. Deputy Chairman, Rajya Sabha, PJ
Kurien, Union Minister for Finance and Corporate
Affairs, Arun Jaitley, Union Minister for Chemicals &
Fertilizers and Parliamentary Affairs, Ananth Kumar,
Minister of State for Minority Affairs and Parliamentary
Affairs, MA Naqvi, and Minister of State for Agriculture
and Farmers Welfare, SS Ahluwalia, are also seen.
Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju, releasing the

BOP handbook, at the launch of the SSBs Intensive
Refresher Training Programme for Border Out Posts, in New
Delhi. DG, Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), Archana
Ramasundaram,
is also seen.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi chairing the NITI Aayog

meeting on 15-year vision document, in New Delhi.
Chief Election Commissioner, Dr Nasim Zaidi,

releasing the NERP guidelines at a function in
New Delhi. Election Commissioners, AK Joti and
OP Rawat, and other dignitaries are also seen.
Minister of State for Commerce and Industry

(Independent Charge), Nirmala Sitharaman, meeting
the Start Up Founders in New Delhi. Secretary, DIPP,
Ramesh Abhishek is also seen.
www.indianbuzz.com

49
STOCK DOCTOR
dr gs sood
Avoid panic buying
HE BSEs market capitalisation

(the
aggregate
value
of
companies trading on BSE)
reached a record high of `108.03
trillion on July 25, 2016 on the back of
strong macro fundamentals coupled
with good monsoon, possibility of
passage of GST Bill at the earliest
and stable corporate earnings that
are likely to grow in double digit
during FY17. Macro indicators show
broadening of the recovery driven
initially by public capex and FDI and
now led by improving consumption
expenditure. Growth estimates have,
therefore, been revised from 7.5 per
cent to 7.7 per cent for FY16 and 7.8 per
cent for FY17. With ample liquidity,
the market has been receiving strong
inflows from FPIs who have by now
invested a net of US$ 984 million
since the start of the year.
I have been advising investors to
use any steep correction as a buying
opportunity since I believe that the
market is set to give decent returns
over a period of 3-5 years. However,
investors may have been disappointed since a correction has so far eluded
them. The most common mistake
investors make is when they feel left
out and start chasing stocks in this
kind of market with almost euphoric
conditions. The phenomena called
panic buying should best be avoided
at this stage. Indias market cap to
GDP ratio, popularly known as Buffett
Indicator is at a six-year high of 79 per
cent. It is considered as one of the
best single measures to understand
where the valuation stands at any
given moment.
The best part is that the market
may continue to rise and defy all

norms for some time. But the more
suave analysts are worried and prefer
to advise investors to stay with cash
instead of chasing the market. Those
who justify current valuations say
that India is a domestic focused economy and local conditions are poised
to get better. However, the liquidity
driven global rally may fizzle out since
clarity on Brexit is still to emerge and
the Indian market has invariably followed global trends. Brexit is not a
one-off event. Its repercussions are
likely to go on for a long period.
However, the Indian market may
not witness a steep correction due to
fundamental change in the kind of
flows the market receives now. There
is a distinct shift from direct investing
by individuals towards investing

through mutual funds, pension funds,
etc. Also, investors prefer the SIP route
instead of playing in the market; SIP
flows are now crossing `3,000 crore a
month. Moreover, the pension money
that has made a beginning into the
equity market will grow in times to
come. With these developments, the
destabilising effect of hot money will
gradually diminish. But the inflation
monster has started raising its ugly
head and may limit the RBIs ability
to cut interest rates further. The fact
that China may resort to currency
devaluation to prevent economic
slowdown could unsettle markets,
including India. The weak external
demand and muted trend in private
capex may continue to drag growth. g
Stock Shop
BY
RAKESH BHARDWAJ
Nitin Spinners
(CMP `74)
HE Rajasthan-based manufacturer of
100% cotton yarn and knitted fabrics
is one of the leading cotton yarn producers
in India. The company has an installed
capacity of 1,50,096 spindles, 2,936
rotors and 49 knitting machines, which
can produce 37,800 tonnes of cotton
yarn and 8,600 tonnes of knitted fabric
per annum. The companys sales, EBITDA
and adjusted PAT have grown at a CAGR
of around 14 per cent annually during
FY11-FY16. During FY16, total revenues
stood at `7,669 million. The company
generated 69 per cent of its revenues from
exports and enjoys presence in more than
40 countries across the globe. Domestic

revenues contributed 31 per cent with
clients like Arvind, Siyaram, Raymond,
Ddcor, Donear, etc.
The company has been prudently
planning expansions and has consciously
capped the interest cost to sales at 5 per
cent. As a part of forward integration,
the company also plans to enter fabric
processing and value added products
which will boost profitability further.
The RoACE of 17.7 per cent for FY17
and 16.7 per cent for FY16 compares
favourably with the industry and is likely
to improve further with rich product mix
and expansion of spindles completing by
March 2017. The stock at 4.4 x FY18 is
available at very attractive valuations and
may give decent returns in 2-3 years.
The author has no exposure in the stock recommended in this column. gfiles does not accept responsibility for investment decisions by
readers of this column. Investment-related queries may be sent to editor@gfilesindia.com with Bhardwajs name in the subject line.
50


www.gfilesindia.com
STOCK DOCTOR
dr gs sood
The author has no exposure in the stock recommended in this column. gfiles does not accept responsibility for investment decisions by
readers of this column. Investment-related queries may be sent to editor@gfilesindia.com with Bhardwajs name in the subject line.
www.indianbuzz.com

51
PERSPECTIVE
devotion sadhguru
OR the past 12 years, I have led

an annual pilgrimage to Mount
Kailash, undeniably the most
mystical mountain on the planet.
Centuries ago, Adiyogi or Shiva, the
greatest yogi of all time, bequeathed
his prodigious knowing to seven
disciples. He was largely successful
in transmitting the immensity of
his wisdom, but not entirely. When
he could not find another human
being who could grasp the incredible
mystical profundity and versatility
that he embodied, he decided to
simply merge into the mountain. That
magnitude is Mount Kailash.
All the dimensions of yoga, the very
mechanics of life, as it were, are preserved in one single source, making it
the most phenomenal fountainhead
of arcane wisdom imaginable. This
is the greatest mystical library on the
planetnot just a repository of information, but a living library.
Each year pilgrims ask me the
same questions: what is the best way
to approach this sacred site? How
can we be most receptive to its reverberation? I tell them time and again
that devotion is the best way, particularly in a place like Kailash where
tremendous activity in the field of
human consciousness has been happening for thousands of years. Does
this mean you have to be devoted to
Shiva? No. What inspires devotion in
you is not the point. You are devoted
to something, thats the point.
Devotion means being devoid of
yourself, or at least a little less full
of yourself. When you are too full
of yourself, nothing can enter you.
But where there is devotion, there is
heightened receptivity, and life could
suddenly explode within you in a way
you have never imagined possible.
Of the four basic dimensions of
body, mind, emotion, and energy,
emotion is the easiest thing to crank
52

Keeping focus
up to the highest intensity. Intensity
in the body or mind needs lot of sadhana or practice. Intensity in energy
needs a tremendous amount of rigour
and grace. But emotional intensity is
something most people are familiar
with. So when we say devotion, all
were trying to do is raise our emotional pitch to its ultimate peak. If
you dont know emotion, devotion
is impossible. Most people can very
easily be cranked up into anger, if
not love. That is fine too. If you can
maintain even anger for 24 hours, you
could end up enlightened! But human
emotion keeps wavering.
A young man once went to a rabbi
and said, I dont know what to do. I
try to practise all that you taught me
but I cant help it. Every day, all I end
up doing is sinning. The wise rabbi
just looked at him and replied, Sin
strongly. And thats really all that it
takes! Anger is an ugly thing. But if
you maintain even intense anger for
24 hours, you will get enlightened. I
promise you that. It is a hard path. To
do so, you need a phenomenal amount
of energy. But it is the fickleness, the
lack of intensity and focus that is the
problem, not the direction.
Essentially, its about doing what
works. Suppose you want to catch

fish, you dont tie a stone to the string,
throw it in and hope a fish will bite. If
you really want to catch fish, you use
the right kind of bait. You sit with the
right kind of attitude. Meditation is
like fishing. You have to just sit there,
motionless, alert. If youre moving
around, talking to your friend, the
fish wont bite. You have to just sit
for hours, unmoving, silent, very
conscious about your every action. A
genuine seeker does the same thing.
In a sense, devotion is just a way
to trick the Creator! If you are truly
receptive, the Creator has no choice
but to accept your invitation. He
knows that you have nothing to give
really, nothing that is truly yours. But
hes wise, he plays along!
So, I tell people, you can choose
your way. Either you walk to Kailash
with absolute devotion or absolute
anger. Both are fine. Both ways it
will work. Whatever you are doing, if
you do it strongly enough, you will, at
some point, hit a dead end. And that is
your destination. For thats what the
Divine is: the ultimate dead end. g
Sadhguru, a yogi, is a visionary,
humanitarian and a prominent spiritual
leader (www.ishafoundation.org)

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sharanv@ias.nic.in
barokaa@ias.nic.in
hemlatha@ias.nic.in
samariya@ias.nic.in
Ranjana Chopra
Avinash Kumar
Manu Shrivastava
Arun Kumar Gupta
CADRE: ODISHA
CADRE: JHARKHAND
CADRE: MADHYA PRADESH
CADRE: HARYANA
choprar@ias.nic.in
kavinash@ias.nic.in
shrimanu@ias.nic.in
arunkr@ias.nic.in
Anindo Majumdar
Sonal Mishra
Subir Kumar
Gurneet Tej
CADRE: GUJARAT
CADRE: RAJASTHAN
CADRE: KARNATAKA
anindo@ias.nic.in
mishras7@ias.nic.in
kumars35@ias.nic.in
gurneet.ias@ias.nic.in
Mary Neelima Karketta
Sanjay Lohiya
TK Ramachandran
M Gopal Reddy
CADRE: MAHARASHTRA
CADRE: TAMIL NADU
karketta@ias.nic.in
lohiyas@ias.nic.in
rchandr3@ias.nic.in

reddymg85@ias.nic.in
16-08-1964
16-08-1974
16-08-1976
17-08-1961
17-08-1967
18-08-1975
18-08-1969
20-08-1964
20-08-1976
21-08-1967
21-08-1971
21-08-1960
22-08-1962
23-08-1964
23-08-1965
24-08-1970
25-08-1980
25-08-1969
26-08-1973
27-08-1976
27-08-1972
28-08-1975
28-08-1963
29-08-1969
30-08-1972
30-08-1969
31-08-1966
01-09-1960
01-09-1963
02-09-1969
02-09-1966
03-09-1972
04-09-1965
04-09-1976
05-09-1966
05-09-1976
06-09-1967
06-09-1975
07-09-1965
08-09-1973
08-09-1971
08-09-1973
10-09-1963
10-09-1973
10-09-1966
11-09-1974
12-09-1971
13-09-1961
14-09-1960
14-09-1966
15-09-1981
15-09-1960
For the complete list, see www.gfilesindia.com
www.indianbuzz.com

53
birthdays
IPS officers birthdays August 16, 2016 Sept 15, 2016
IPS officers birthdays August 16, 2016 Sept 15, 2016
KC Verma
Sheel Vardhan Singh
Sujanvir Singh
Rajesh Gupta
CADRE: BIHAR
kcverma@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
vardhan@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
sujanvirs@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
rajeshgupta@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Arun Kumar Choudhary
Sunil Agarwal
TJ Long Kumeer
Arshinder Singh Chawla
CADRE: JAMMU & KASHMIR
CADRE: KARNATAKA
CADRE: CHHATTISGARH
CADRE: HARYANA
akchoudhary@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
sagarwal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
longkumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
aschawla@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Sajjad Wasi Naqvi
Hargobinder Singh
Sushma Singh
Akshay Sachdeva
CADRE: AGMUT
CADRE: SIKKIM
swnaqvi@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
hsdhaliwal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
sushmasingh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
akshay@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Priya Singh
Bhanwar Lal Meena
Tajendra Singh Luthra
Mukesh Gupta
CADRE: JHARKHAND
CADRE: RAJASTHAN
CADRE: AGMUT
CADRE: CHHATTISGARH
priyadubey@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
blmeena@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
tsluthra@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
mukeshgupta@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Yatindra Koyal
KP Venkateshwar Rao
Pramod Ban
Santosh Kumar
CADRE: ODISHA
CADRE: PUNJAB
CADRE: TAMIL NADU
ykoyal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
kpvrao@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
pramodban@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
santosh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Hawa S Ghumaria
Ashutosh Kumar
Mamta Singh
Anil Paliwal
CADRE: RAJASTHAN
CADRE: HARYANA
CADRE: RAJASTHAN
hsghumaria@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
ashutoshkr@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
mamta@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
anil@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Peram Laxmipathi
Debasis Panigrahi
Prabhat Ranjan Deo
Anubhav
CADRE: HIMACHAL PRADESH
CADRE: ODISHA
CADRE: HARYANA
plaxmipathi@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
debasis@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
prdeo@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
anubhav@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
P Sitharama Anjaneyulu
Ashok Mutha Jain
Vinay Kumar
Sushil Mansing Khopde
CADRE: BIHAR
CADRE: BIHAR
sitharama@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
ashokmjain@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
vinay_kumar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
smkhopde@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Anand Jain
Sagar Preet
Kuldip Singh
Jalli Ajoy Kumar
CADRE: AGMUT
CADRE: WEST BENGAL
anandjain@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
sagarpreet@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
kuldipsingh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
jkajoy@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Yogesh Mudgal
Mahipal Yadav
Sanjay A Lathkar
Manish Kumar Agarwal
CADRE: KERALA
CADRE: JHARKHAND
CADRE: AGMUT
ymudgal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
mahipalyadav@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
salathkar@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
mkagarwal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Sandeep Mittal
D Shriniwas Rao
MN Dinesh
Gogulothu Lekshman
CADRE: TAMIL NADUPUNJAB
CADRE: RAJASTHAN
CADRE: KERALA
sandeepmittal@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
dsrao@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
mndinesh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
glekshman@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Malothu Ramulu Naik
Uttam Chand
Gajendra Kumar Goswamy
Santosh Bala
CADRE: BIHAR
CADRE: ODISHA
mrnaik@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
uttam@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
gkgoswamy@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
santoshbala@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
Baduga Deva Paulson
Vishal Garg
Vijay Pratap Singh Kunwar
Prashant S Burde
CADRE: WEST BENGAL
CADRE: PUNJAB
CADRE: MAHARASHTRA
bdpaulson@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
vgarg@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
kvpsingh@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
psburde@mail.svpnpa.gov.in
16-08-1961
16-08-1964
17-08-1963
18-08-1974
18-08-1973
20-08-1970
20-08-1968
21-08-1966
22-08-1972
23-08-1965
24-08-1968
25-08-1972
25-08-1969
26-08-1963
26-08-1961
27-08-1972
27-08-1969
28-08-1968
28-08-1974
29-08-1965
30-08-1966
30-08-1969
30-08-1965
31-08-1963
31-08-1970
31-08-1974
01-09-1961
01-09-1962
01-09-1964
02-09-1964
02-09-1968
02-09-1970
03-09-1960
03-09-1965
04-09-1962
05-09-1968
06-09-1971
06-09-1965
06-09-1969
07-09-1964
08-09-1967
08-09-1967
09-09-1962
09-09-1976
10-09-1971
11-09-1975
12-09-1969
13-09-1968
4-09-1971
15-09-1973
15-09-1969
15-09-1966
54

www.gfilesindia.com
Lok Sabha Members August 16, 2016 Sept 15, 2016

Bahadur Singh Koli
virendra.kashyap@sansad.nic.in
BJP (Rajasthan)
Harish Chandra Meena
16-08-1961
bahardursinghkoli@gmail.com
05-09-1954
Sankar Prasad Datta
meena.harishchandra@sansad.nic.in
CPI-M (Tripura)
KRP Prabakaran
BJP (Raj)
18-08-1957
05-09-1980
sankar.datta@sansad.nic.in
AIADMK (Tamil Nadu)
Mala Rajya Laxmi Shah
Mohanbhai K Kundariya
23-08-1950
BJP (Uttarakhand)
06-09-1951
mala.laxmi@sansad.nic.in
BJP (Gujarat)
Subhash Ramrao
Bharat Singh
BJP (Maharashtra)
BJP (Uttar Pradesh)
11-09-1953
15-09-1948
sr.bhamre@sansad.nic.in
Shanta Kumar
12-09-1934
BJP (Himachal Pradesh)
shanta.kumar@sansad.nic.in
Anil Shirole
13-09-1950
BJP (Maharashtra)
Charanjeet Singh Rori

15-09-1969
INLD (Haryana)
charnajeet.rori@sansad.nic.in
Jitendra Singh
15-09-1956
BJP (Jammu & Kashmir)
anil.shirole@sansad.nic.in
kundariya.mohanbhaik@sansad.nic.in
Maneka Sanjay Gandhi
Ratna De Nag
26-08-1956
BJP (Uttar Pradesh)
06-09-1948
gandhim@sansad.nic.in
AITC (West Bengal)
ratna.de@sansad.nic.in
YS Avinash Reddy
Anju Bala
27-08-1984
YSR Congress Party (Andhra Pradesh)
06-09-1979
BJP (Uttar Pradesh)
Midhun Reddy
anju.bala@sansad.nic.in
29-08-1977
YSR Congress Party (Andhra Pradesh)
Sugata Bose
07-09-1956
Lalubhai Babubhai Patel
AITC (West Bengal)
31-08-1955
sugata.bose@sansad.nic.in
BJP (Daman & Diu)
Bhairon Prasad Mishra
damanmp@hotmail.com
07-09-1958
Radha Mohan Singh
BJP (Uttar Pradesh)
01-09-1949
bhairon.prasad@sansad.nic.in
BJP (Bihar)
Giriraj Singh
rmsingh@sansad.nic.in
08-09-1952
Thupstan Chhewang
BJP (Bihar)
01-09-1947
giriraj.singh@sansad.nic.in
BJP (Jammu & Kashmir)
Bhartruhari Mahtab
S Selvakumara Chinnayan
01-09-1958
08-09-1957
BJD (Odisha)
bmahtab@sansad.nic.in
AIADMK (Tamil Nadu)
AT Nana Patil
Gajanan Chandrakant Kirtikar 09-09-1961
03-09-1943
BJP (Maharashtra)
SS (Maharashtra)
atnana.patil@sansad.nic.in
Gaurav Gogoi
Bhola Singh
INC (Assam)
BJP (Uttar Pradesh)
gaurav.gogoi@sansad.nic.in
bholasingh.mp@sansad.nic.in
Kunwar Haribansh Singh
Ravneet Singh
APNA DAL (Uttar Pradesh)
INC (Punjab)
kuwarharivansh.singh@sansad.nic.in
ravneet.bittu@sansad.nic.in
Virender Kashyap
Dushyant Singh
BJP (Himachal Pradesh)
BJP (Rajasthan)
10-09-1977
04-09-1982
04-09-1950
05-09-1950
Lok Sabha Members August 16, 2016 Sept 15, 2016
10-09-1975
11-09-1973
Rajya Sabha Members August 16, 2016 Sept 15, 2016

Nirmala Sitharaman
CP Thakur
BJP (Karnataka)
BJP (Bihar)
nsitharaman@gmail.com
cp.thakur@sansad.nic.in
Ahmed Patel
Janardan Dwivedi
INC (Gujarat)
INC (Delhi)
patelm@sansad.nic.in
jdwivedi@sansad.nic.in
Kanwar Deep Singh
Ram Narain Dudi
AITC (West Bengal)
BJP (Rajasthan)
Kanwar.deep@sansad.nic.in
dudi.ramnarayan@sansad.nic.in
Ravi Prakash Verma
Rajkumar Dhoot
SP(Uttar Pradesh)
SS (Maharashtra)
rpverma@sansad.nic.in
rndhoot@sansad.nic.in
Sanjay Dattatraya Kakade
Thota Seetharama Lakshmi
IND.(Maharashtra)
TDP (Andhra Pradesh)
Sanjay.kakade@sansad.nic.in
seethe.ramalakshmi@sansad.nic.in
Ravi Shankar Prasad
Ram Jethmalani
BJP(Bihar)
RJD (Bihar)
ravis@sansad.nic.in
jethmlni@sansad.nic.in
N Shankarbhai Vegad
Subramanian Swamy
BJP (Gujarat)
BJP (Nominated)
sn.vagad@sansad.nic.in
swamy39@gmail.com
18-08-1959
21-08-1949
21-08-1961
26-08-1960
29-08-1967
30-08-1954
02-09-1955
03-09-1931
05-09-1945
10-09-1948
11-09-1955
12-09-1951
14-09-1923
15-09-1939
SEND YOUR GREETINGS
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55
Tracking
For a complete list of appointments & retirements, see www.gfilesindia.com
SMITA CHUGH
M SATHIAVATHY
RAJIV KAPOOR
The 1980-batch IAS officer of the Jharkhand

cadre has been appointed Member
Secretary, Tariff Commission.
The 1982-batch IAS officer of the AGMUT

cadre has been appointed Secretary,
Ministry of Labour & Employment.
BP SHARMA
DEEPAK SINGHAL
The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Uttar

Pradesh cadre currently serving as Director,
Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy
of Administration (LBSNAA), has been
upgraded to the grade of Secretary.
The 1981-batch IAS officer of the Bihar cadre

has been appointed Secretary, Department
of Personnel & Training.

Pradesh cadre has been appointed Chief
Secretary of UP.
ARUNA SHARMA
AMARJEET SINHA
The 1982-batch IAS officer of the

Madhya Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Secretary, Ministry of Steel.
The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Bihar

Department of Rural Development.
DINESH SINGH
AMARJIT SINGH

Pradesh cadre has been appointed
Secretary, Department of Land Resources,
and Ministry of Rural Development.
The 1982-batch IAS officer of the Gujarat

Ministry of Water Resources and River
Development.
LATHA KRISHNA RAO
CK MISHRA

Karnataka cadre has been appointed
Secretary, Department of Social Justice &
Empowerment.
The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Bihar

Department of Health & Family Welfare.
ARUNA SUNDARAJAN

Rajasthan cadre has been appointed
Secretary, National Commission for
Backward Classes (NCBC).
The 1982-batch IAS officer of the Kerala

cadre has been appointed Secretary, Ministry
of Electronics & Information Technology.
RAKESH SRIVASTAVA
Moving On: IAS officers retiring in August 2016

ASSAM
Ram Tirath Jindal (1983)

Sathya Prakash Tucker
ANDHRA PRADESH
Sathya Prakash Tucker (1981)

Dr. Vijay Kumar
CHHATTISGARH
Dr. BS Anant (1993)

Dr. BBL Tiwari (1996)
GUJARAT
MA Narmawala (1998)
GR Chaudhari (1999)
JHAKHAND
Suman Kumar (2002)
MAHARASHTRA
SK Sawant (1993)
MADHYA PRADESH
JN Malpani (1994)
Shyam Sundar Bansal (1998)
56

BK PRASAD
The 1983-batch IAS officer of the Tamil
Nadu cadre has been appointed Secretary,
National Commission for Denotified,
Nomadic & Semi-Nomadic Tribes.
AC VERMA
The 1994-batch IAS officer of the AGMUT
cadre has been given additional charge of
the post of Managing Director, DSFDC, Delhi
Government.
SANJAY BHAVSAR
The officer will continue working as OSD to
the Prime Minister on co-terminus basis. He
was recently awarded IAS cadre in Gujarat.
SUSHIL KUMAR SINGLA

The 1994-batch IFS officer of the Himachal
Pradesh cadre has been appointed as
Private Secretary to Dr Sanjeev Kumar
Balyan Minister of State for Water
Resources, River Development & Ganga
Rejuvenation.
NM KOTHARI
Preet Dev Singh Shergill (2006)

Madhya Pradesh cadre has been
appointed as Private Secretary to
Narendra Singh Tomar, Minister for Rural
Development, Panchayati Raj and Drinking
Water & Sanitation.
RAJASTHAN
SHIAVAX JAL VAZIFDAR
ODISHA
Ashok Kumar Tripathy (1981)
PUNJAB
Rakesh Verma (1981)

Balkishan Meena (1982)
Rajesh Yadav (2012)
TELENGANA
J Raymond Peter (1984)
UTTAR PRADESH
Aradhana Johri (1980)

Indraveer Singh Yadav (2000)
Ajay Kumar Upadhyay (2000)
Rajesh Kumar Singh (2002)
DELHI
Vijay Shankar Madan (1981)
The justice has been appointed Chief Justice

of Punjab & Haryana High Court.
DILIP BHOSALE
The justice has been appointed Chief Justice
of Allahabad High Court.
RAJESH KUMAR CHATURVEDI

The 1987-batch IAS officer of the Madhya
Chairman, Central Board of Secondary
Education (CBSE).
VIJAY KUMAR DEV

The 1987-batch IAS officer of the UT cadre
has been appointed Deputy Election
Commissioner.

www.gfilesindia.com
VIJAYA BHASKAR GURALA

The 1999-batch IES officer has been
appointed Director, Cabinet Secretariat.
RAHUL KUMAR
The 1997-batch ITS officer has been
appointed Regional Director, Staff Selection
Commission (SSC), Allahabad.
VIJAY KUMAR
The 1992-batch IAS officer of the UT cadre
has been appointed Secretary to Delhi Lt
Governor Najeeb Jung.
SHAMBHU SINGH YADAV

The former Secretary to the UP Chief
Minister has been appointed Up-Lokyukta
in the state.
AMRITA DASH
The 2006-batch IPS officer of the Odisha
cadre has been appointed Assistant
Director at SP level, Sardar Vallabhbhai
Patel National Police Academy (SVPNPA),
Hyderabad.
ARUN BHAT
The former 1993-batch IAS officer has again
been appointed OSD to Madhya Pradesh
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
RUPINDER SINGH
Maharashtra cadre has been appointed
Deputy Director General (DDG), Unique
Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
SUDESH K SHAHI
The Central Secretariat Service (CSS)
AGMUT CADRE IAS OFFICERS GET

NEW POSTING
The following six IAS officers of the
AGMUT cadre have been posted at
new places in Delhi Government:
DHARMENDRA SHARMA, 1988
batch, has been appointed Principal
Secretary, Finance; ABRAHAM, 1998
batch, is Secretary, Art & Culture;
RAKESH BALI, 2001 batch, has
been moved as Secretary, Finance;
SP SINGH, 2002 batch, has been
appointed MD. DT&TDC; NK SHARMA,
2002 batch, is Secretary, Languages;
SN MISHRA, 2003 batch, is Director
Training, UTCS.
www.indianbuzz.com
NEW ADDITIONAL SECRETARIES

1. The 1985-batch IAS officer of the Himachal Pradesh cadre, SANJEEV GUPTA, has
been appointed Additional Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy (DIPP) and
Promotion, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, in place of Shatrughna Singh,
1983-batch Uttarakhand cadre IAS, who is now the state Chief Secretary.
2. VANDITA SHARMA, 1986-batch Karnataka cadre lAS, currently in her cadre, has
been appointed Member (Finance), Atomic Energy Space Earth Commission.
3. ANSHU PRAKASH, 1986-batch AGMUT cadre IAS and Joint Secretary in the
Department of Health and Family Welfare has been appointed Additional Secretary,
Department of Heavy Industries.
4. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the Uttarakhand cadre, UTPAL KUMAR SINGH, has
been appointed Additional Secretary, Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and
Farmers Welfare.
5. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the Maharashtra cadre, JAYASHREE MUKHERJEE, has
been appointed Additional Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
6. ALOK TANDON, 1986-batch IAS officer of the UP cadre, and Joint Secretary in the
Cabinet Secretariat has been appointed Additional Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat.
7. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the Bihar cadre, ALOK VARDHAN CHATURVEDI,
Joint Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat, has been appointed Additional Secretary,
Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and Industry.
8. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the MP cadre, PRAMOD KUMAR DAS, Joint
Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training, Ministry of Personnel, Public
Grievances and Pensions has been appointed Additional Secretary, Department of
Expenditure, Ministry of Finance.
9. The 1981-batch IES officer, GAJENDRA BHUJBAL, has been appointed Additional
Secretary and Financial Adviser (AS & FA), Department of Fertilizers, Ministry of
Chemicals and Fertilizers.
10. INDER JIT SINGH, 1985-batch IAS officer of the Kerala cadre, has been appointed
Additional Secretary, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.
11. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the UP cadre, UMESH SINHA, currently Deputy
Election Commissioner has been upgraded to the level of Additional Secretary.
12. ANIL KUMAR KHACHI, 1986-batch Himachal cadre IAS and Chief Vigilance Officer
in Food Corporation of India (FCI), has been appointed Additional Secretary in the
Department of Financial Services.
13. BIPIN BIHARI MALLICK, 1986-batch Maharashtra cadre IAS and Joint Secretary in
the Ministry of Labour and Employment, has been appointed Additional Secretary
in the Ministry of Home Affairs in place of Braj Kishore Prasad, 1983-batch Tamil
Nadu cadre lAS, on his superannuation on July 31, 2016.
14. SINGH BHULLAR, 1986-batch UP cadre lAS and Joint Secretary, Ministry of Civil
Aviation, has been appointed Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Civil Aviation
by upgrading the post for two years or until further orders, whichever is earlier.
15. GURUPRASAD MOHAPATRA, 1986-batch Gujarat cadre lAS and Joint Secretary,
Department of Commerce, has been appointed Chairman of Airports Authority of
India in place of RK Shrivastava, 1984-batch Jharkhand cadre lAS.
16. SP SINGH PARIHAR, 1986-batch MP cadre IAS and Joint Secretary in the Cabinet
Secretariat has been appointed as Chairman of Central Pollution Control Board in
place of Prof SP Gautam, in the rank and pay of Additional Secretary.
17. The 1986-batch IAS officer of the J&K cadre, SURESH KUMAR, currently Joint
Secretary, Ministry of Defence, has been upgraded as Additional Secretary,
Ministry of Defence.
18. VEENA ISH, 1985 batch Andhra Pradesh cadre lAS, has been appointed Member
(Administration), National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) in place of Narendra
Kumar, 1988-batch AGMUR cadre lAS, on his premature repatriation to his cadre.
19. ABHAY TRIPATHI, 1986-batch Andhra Pradesh cadre IAS, and Senior Directing Staff
(Joint Secretary level), National Defence College has been promoted to Additional
Secretary by upgrading the post.

57
Tracking
officer has been appointed Deputy Director

General (C&A), Telecommunications.
NEERJA ADIDAM
The 1990-batch IFS officer of the Uttar
Managing Director, National Food Security
Mission (NFSM).
VANDANA SHARMA
The Central Secretariat Service (CSS) officer
has been appointed Secretary, Petroleum
and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB).
DEVYANI KHOBARGADE
The former Deputy Consul-General of India
in New York has been appointed Private
Secretary to Minister of State Ramdas
Athawale.
ABHAY THAKUR
The 1992-batch IFS officer, Joint Secretary
in the Ministry of External Affairs, has been
appointed High Commissioner of India to
the Republic of Mauritius.
RAJEEV KUMAR
The 2001-batch IFS officer, Ambassador of
India to the Republic of Senegal, has been
concurrently accredited as the Ambassador
of India to the Islamic Republic of the
Gambia, with residence in Dakar (Senegal).
RESHUFFLE OF IAS OFFICERS IN

HARYANA
The following IAS officers have been
given new postings in Haryana:
SK GULATI has been appointed
Additional Chief Secretary, Printing
& Stationery; ROOP RAM JOWEL
appointed Additional Chief Secretary,
Industrial Training and is also
Additional Chief Secretary, Forests &
Wild Life; AMIT JHA has been posted
as Principal Secretary; Social Justice
& Empowerment; SAMEER PAL SROW
appointed Director, Information,
Public Relations & Cultural Affairs &
Languages & Grievances and Director,
Hospitality and is also Managing
Director, Tourism Development
Corporation Ltd; SHEKHAR VIDYARTHI
is Director, Urban Local Bodies
and Mission Director, State Urban
Livelihood Mission and State Urban
Development Authority.
NEW JOINT SECRETARIES OF GOVERNMENT OF INDIA

1. The 1987-batch IAS officer of the UP cadre, SUNIL KUMAR, has been appointed Joint
Secretary, Commerce.
2. The 1990-batch IAS officer of the Manipur-Tripura cadre, K MOSES CHALAI, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Women & Child Development.
3. The 1991-batch IAS officer of the Karnataka cadre, VIDYAVATHI V, has been
appointed Joint Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat.
4. The Indian P&T Finance & Accounts Service officer of the 1992 batch GYANESHWAR
K SINGH, has been appointed Joint Secretary, Corporate Affairs.
5. The 1993-batch Indian Defence Accounts Service officer, AJAY RAMESH SULE, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Home Affairs.
6. The 1987-batch Indian Postal Service officer, STEPHEN MERVIN ALEXANDER, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Atomic Energy.
7. The 1998-batch IAS officer of the Assam-Meghalaya cadre, G DEV TRIPATHI, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Department of Personal and Training (DoPT).
8. The 1991-batch IAS officer of the Assam-Meghalaya cadre, VIJAYNDRA, has been
appointed Joint Secretary, Defence Production.
9. The Central Secretariat Service (CSS) officer, M SUBBARAYAN, has been appointed
Joint Secretary, Defence.
10. The 1995-batch IAS officer of the HP cadre, BHARAT H KHERA, has been appointed
Joint Secretary, Defence.
11. The 1991-batch IAS officer, JAN-E-ALAM, has been appointed Joint Secretary,
Minority Affairs.
12. The 1992-batch IDAS officer, VANDANA KUMAR, has been appointed Joint Secretary,
Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Ministry of Commerce & Industry.
13. The 1989-batch IPS officer of the Himachal Pradesh cadre, SANJAY KUNDU, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Water Resources.
14. The 1993-batch officer of the Indian P&T Finance & Accounts Service, PRANAV
KHULLAR, has been appointed Joint Secretary, Culture.
15. The CSS officer, VK GAUBA, has been appointed Joint Secretary, Health Research,
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
16. The 1988-batch IPS officer of the Jharkhand cadre, SATYA NARAYAN PRADHAN, has
been appointed Joint Secretary, Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region
(DoNER).
17. The CSS officer, RK GUPTA, has been appointed Joint Secretary, Labour and
Employment.
18. The 1995-batch IAS officer of the Bihar cadre, B RAJENDER, has been appointed Joint
Secretary, Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare.
MANU TENTIWAL
DALIP SINGH
The 2003-batch officer of the IRS-IT cadre

has been appointed Private Secretary to
Santosh Kumar Gangwar, Minister of State
for Finance.
The 1982 batch Haryana cadre (retd) IAS

officer has been appointed as State Election
Commissioner, Haryana.
ABP PANDEY
The IFS officer has been appointed the next

Ambassador of India to Libya.

Maharashtra cadre has been appointed
Chief Executive Officer, Unique
Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
VK SAKSENA
The IRSIT officer has been appointed Chief
Vigilance Officer, Power Grid Corporation of
India Ltd. (PGCIL), Gurgaon.
VS CHAUHAN
BIJIN KRISHNA
The 2012-batch IAS officer of the West
Bengal cadre has been appointed as
Officer-on-Special Duty & under Secretary,
Home Department.
SANJAY SOOD
The 1993-batch IFS officer of the Himachal
58


www.gfilesindia.com
MAJOR RESHUFFLE OF IPS

OFFICERS IN HARYANA
The following IPS officers have been
transferred and posted to different
places in Haryana: K SELVARAJ
as Commandant General, Home
Guards, and Director, Civil Defence;
RAJVANT PAL SINGH as DGP, OSD
Rules, Police Headquarters; BK
SINHA as Special DG, State Vigilance
Bureau, and Director General,
Bhondsi Complex; KK SINDHU as
Director General (DG), Madhuban
Complex; KK SHARMA as Director,
V&S, Haryana Vidyut Prasaran
Nigam Limited (HVPNL), Panchkula;
AS CHAWLA, Inspector General
of Police (Administration), Police
Headquarters, and CS RAO, IGP, Law
and Order, will swap their respective
places of posting; SAURABH
SINGH has been appointed Deputy
Inspector General (DIG), Security,
CID; RAKESH ARYA has been posted
as Rohtak SP; SHASHANK ANAND
will now be SP Jind; MANEESH
CHAUDHARY is SP Yamunanagar;
SUMER PARTAP SINGH has been
appointed SP, Kaithal; SUMIT
KUMAR is SP Panipat; RAHUL
SHARMA is SP Palwal; DEEPAK
GAHLAWAT is SP Administration,
Police Headquarters; KULDEEP
SINGH is SP Mewat; and BALWAN
SINGH has been posted as SP, State
Crime Branch.
IPS OFFICERS TRANSFERRED IN MP

The following IPS officers have
been transferred and posted to
different places in Madhya Pradesh:
RINA MITRA has been posted as
Chairperson, Police Housing Corp;
ANURADHA SHANKAR is ADG,
Administration; SW NAQVI is ADG,
PSO to DGP; G JANARDHAN has been
appointed IG, Anti-Naxal Campaign;
GAURAVA RAJPUT as Commandant,
Indore; AP SINGH as Commandant,
RAPTC Indore; TARUN NAYAK as
Commandant Mandla; GAURAV
TIWARI as SP Katna; ASIT YADAV
as SP, Balaghat and LODHA RAHUL
KUMAR as SP, Mandla.
www.indianbuzz.com
IRS-CUSTOMS OFFICERS TRANSFERRED

The following IRS-customs officers in the grade of Commissioner of Customs and
Central Excise have been transferred and posted to different places: ASHOK has
been shifted to Trichy Cus (P); BVVT NAIK to Hyderabad Appeals ST; BIJOY KUMAR
KAR moves to Belgaum CX; D KRISHNA SRINIVAS has been appointed to Vizag
Audit CX; GOPI NATH to Bhopal Appeals-II CX; KC JOHNY to Hyderabad Appeals
CX; K CHANDRA SEKHAR to ADG, DG Audit Hyderabad; M MATHEW JOLLY to Goa
Customs; MRR REDDY to ADG DG Systems Delhi; MVS CHAUDHARY to Pune Cus;
N SRIDHAR to Pune ST; PRAMOD KUMAR AGARWAL to Jabalpur CX; PREM NATH
TIWARI to Allahabad CX; SAMANJASA DAS to Meerut Appeals-I CX; SIMMI JAIN
to Jodhpur Cus Prev; V RAMA MATHEW to Mumbai Cus I AP; VELURU SANTOSH
to Thiruvananthapuram CX; MM PATHIBHAN to ADG, DG Vigilance Chennai SZU;
SK VIMALANATHAN to Thane-I CX; ANUJ GOGIA to Dehradun CX; RAJEEV GUPTA
to Rajkot Appeals; VIRENDRA KUMAR CHAUDHARY to Surat CX I; AJAY SAXENA
to Bangalore Appeal II CX; PAWAN KUMAR SINHA to ADG, DG NACEN Vadodara;
MALLIKA MAHAJAN SINHA to Anand CX; BODDULURI HARE RAM to Vizag-III
CX; MADUR SREEDHAR to Chenna Audit ST; VASA SESHA GIRI RAO to ADG, DG
NACEN, Chennai; CR MEENA to Jodhpur CX; CHANDRA PRAKASH to CCF Delhi;
PRADEEP KUMAR to Mumbai Appeals-II; RESHMA LAKHANI to Silvassa CX;
SHAWNA KUMAR to Nava Sheva-III Cus; VANDANA JAIN to Pune Audit ST; MANOJ
KUMAR SRIVASTAVA to Jamnagar Cus P; SANJAY RATHI to Nagpur CX Audit-I;
SATYAJIT SINGH to Delhi Audit-I ST; RANJAN KUMAR SAHOO to Ranchi-I CX; MR
MOHANTI to Nava Sheva-II Cus; PVN SURESH BABU to Calicut CX; YOGPAL SINGH
to Kolkata-IV CX; AJAY DIXIT to Lucknow Appeals CX; SANJAY PANT to Bangalore
Appeals Customs; JR PANIGRAHI to Delhi Appeals Cus; RAJ KUMAR to Kolkata
Audit ST; VIMAL KISHORE VERMA to Vadodara Appeals-II, CX Surat; M SRINIVAS
to Hyderabad-III CX; SANJEEV SRIVASTAVA to Delhi-III CX; MADAN MOHAN SINGH
to Meerut-II Appeals CX NOIDA; YD BANGA to Chandigarh, Appeals-II CX Ludhiana;
C DHANASEKARAN to Mumbai ST VII; RAJENDRA SINGH to Ghaziabad CX; RAJESH
NANDAN to ICD, Tuglakabad Import Cus Delhi; MANOJ KRISHNA to Mumbai AppealsII ST; SHAYAM RAJ PRASAD to Mumbai ST-VI; V VALTE to Lucknow CX; SEEMA
JERE BISHT to ADG, RMD Mumbai; ARUNA NARAYAN GUPTA to Delhi ST II; JAYANT
KUMAR JHA to Ranchi Appeal CX; GD LOHANI to Tax Policy Research Unit, TPRU,
DOR Delhi; SATISH KUMAR AGARWAL to ADG, DGCEI HQ, Delhi; VIVEK CHATURVEDI
to ADG DGRI, HQ Delhi; JM KENNEDY to ADG, DGRI, Chennai ZU; S KANNAN to Salem
CX; KULKARNI NARENDRA VISHWANATH to Raigard CX Mumbai zone-II CX; and
SANAR CHAND was posted to Kanpur CX.
CHIEF SECRETARIES EMPANELLED
Chief Secretaries of four states have been empanelled to the rank of Secretary in
the Government of India: AP PADHI Odisha, BASUDEB BANERJEE West Bengal,
SHATRUGHNA SINGH Uttarakhand and KK SHARMA Delhi.
Pradesh cadre has been posted as Member

Secretary, HP State Pollution Control Board,
Shimla.
SC VERMA
VIRENDRA SINGH
HANUMANTHARAYAPPA

Maharashtra cadre has been posted
as Director, Municipal Administration,
Mumbai.
He has been appointed Chairman, Central

Silk Board (CSB), Bangalore for a period of
three years.
GOPAL GUPTA
The IRSME officer has been appointed CMD

of the Konkan Railway Corporation Ltd
(KRCL).
The 1993-batch IPS officer is the new DG

Railway Police, in Uttar Pradesh.
The 1986-batch IPS officer of the Gujarat

cadre has been appointed IG, CRPF.
SANJAY GUPTA

59
Tracking
RESHUFFLE OF IPS OFFICERS IN

TAMIL NADU
The following IPS officers have
been transferred and posted to
different places in Tamil Nadu: P
THAMARAIKANNAN has been posted
as new Additional Commissioner
of Police, Intelligence Section,
Chennai Police; V VARADARAJU
is IGP, Central Zone, Tiruchi; NK
SENTHAMARAIKANNAN is IGP, North
Zone, Chennai; C SRIDHAR has been
posted as Additional Commissioner
of Police, North, Chennai Police; SN
SESHASAI as Additional Commissioner
of Police, Headquarters, Chennai
Police; ARUNACHALAM as Additional
Commissioner of Police, Central Crime
Branch, Chennai Police; J MAHESH as
Superintendent of Police, Thanjavur;
R SUDHAKAR as Deputy Commissioner
of Police, Ambattur, Chennai Police;
V BASKARAN as Superintendent of
Police, Theni district; A MYILVAGANAN
as DCP, Law and Order, Tiruchi City;
R SAKTHIVEL as DCP, Flower Bazaar,
Chennai Police; T SENTHIL KUMAR
as SP, Tiruchi district; S SELVAKUMAR
as DCP, Pulianthope, Chennai Police;
and RUPESH KUMAR MEENA has
been posted as DCP (Traffic West),
Chennai Police.
ASST COMMISSIONERS OF
POLICE TRANSFERRED IN
DELHI GOVT
The following Assistant
Commissioners of Police have
been shifted in Delhi Government:
SUMAN KANT JHA has been shifted
as ACP, Kalyan Puri East District;
ACHIT SINGHAL is ACP, Operations,
South West District; ASHOK KUMAR
is ACP, RP Bhawan; MANSVI JAIN
is ACP, Traffic; MAYANK BANSAL
is ACP, Special Branch; BALRAM is
ACP, Special Branch; DABHI ANAND
DINESH B is ACP/DIU, New Delhi
district; RAJNIKANT AWADHIYA is
ACP, Traffic; GAURAV GUPTA is ACP,
DIU, East district; JAGJIT SINGH
is ACP, PCR; RAJINDER SINGH is
ACP, DIU, South West District; and
RAMAN KUMAR LAMBA is ACP, 1st
Bn DAP.
60

IRS-IT OFFICERS AT COMMISSIONER LEVEL TRANSFERRED

The following officers of IRS Income Tax cadre in the grade of Commissioner of
Income Tax have been transferred to different places: RAVI SARANGAL has been
appointed CIT (DR) (ITAT)-1, Chandigarh; RAVJIT SINGH ARNEJA was posted as CIT
(Audit & ITAT), Nagpur; SHYAMA S BANSIA has been posted as CIT A-15, Delhi;
M RATHINASAMY was appointed ADG (Vigilance)(South), CBDT, Chennai; M
KRISHNASAMY as Secretary, ITSC, Chennai; BONANI GHOSH as CIT(DR) (ITAT)-1,
Kolkata; MAN SINGH MEENA as CIT(DR) (ITAT), Jaipur; SARAT KUMAR DASH as
CIT A-1, Vishakhapatnam; RAJEEV VARSHNEY as CIT(TDS), Bhubaneshwar; AJAY
GOYAL as CIT A-2, Gurgaon; G APARNA RAO as CIT(DR) (ITAT)-2, Hyderabad; DEEPAK
SEHGAL as CIT(OSD), Delhi; NIKHIL PANDIT as CIT(OSD), Delhi; PRABHSHARN
SINGH CHHINA as CIT(DR) (ITAT)-1, Bengaluru; RAJESH KUMAR GUPTA as CIT(DR),
ITSC-3, Delhi; PAWAN K KUMAR as CIT A-2, Jalandhar; SAYED NASIR ALI as CIT(A),
Alwar; PIRTHI LAL as CIT A-4, Ludhiana; ANADI VARMA as CIT A-28, Mumbai; S
BHARATH as CIT A-14, Chennai; SUDHANSHU SHEKHAR JHA as CIT A-2, Kochi; VIVEK
MISRA as CIT(A), Faizabad; SANJAY MISRA as CIT(DR)(ITAT)-2, Lucknow; SUBRATA
SARKAR as ADG(RTI), Patna; KAVITA BHATNAGAR as ADG (Recovery) CBDT, Delhi;
DHEERAJ BHATNAGAR as CIT(A), Gwalior; PARAMITA TRIPATHY as CIT(DR)(ITAT)-6,
Delhi; SAROJ KUMAR MAHAPATRA as CIT(Admin. & TPS), Bhubaneshwar; R JEYA
KUMAR as CIT A-2, Tiruchirappalli; PIYUSHCHANDRA VISHNU KOLHE as CIT A-2,
Bhubaneshwar; BHAVNA C YASHROY as CIT A-1, Panaji; NARESH KUMAR BALODIA
as Secretary (AAR), Mumbai; SIBICHEN K MATHEW as CIT(TDS), Bengaluru; ASHISH
GUPTA as CIT A-1, Chandigarh; VIRENDRA OJHA as DIT(Inv.)(ITSC)-1, Mumbai; K
DEVA RATHNA KUMAR as CIT(A), TIRUPATI; SANJAY KUMAR as CIT A-11, Kolkata;
JAHANZEB AKHTAR as CIT A-6, Chennai; SANGEETA M GODBOLE as CIT A-1,
Jalandhar; P CHANDRASEKHA R as CIT(TDS), Hyderabad; MEENAKSHI SINGH as
CIT A-21, Delhi; SANT SARAN MANTRI as CIT A-2, Indore; DEEPIKA MITTAL as CIT
A-40, Delhi CCA; RENU JAUHRI as CIT, Audit-1, Delhi CCA; N C SWAIN as CIT A-32,
Delhi CCA; RENUKA JAIN GUPTA as CIT A Ghaziabad CCA; SULEKHA VERMA as CIT
DR ITAT-4, Delhi CCA; ASHISH KUMAR as CIT, APA-1, Delhi CCA; V VIVEKANANDAN
as CIT A Pondicherry; ANURAG GOYAL as CIT DR ITAT, Delhi CCA; VANDANA SAGAR
as CIT A-13, Bengaluru; AMRITA MISHRA as CIT Admin & TPS, Nagpur CCA; ANAND
KUMAR KEDIA as CIT A-7 Kolkata CCA WB & Sikkim; MANOJ PANDEY as CIT Admin
& TPS, Lucknow; AMOL SUDHIR KAMAT as CIT A-2, Kolhapur; NANDITA KANCHAN
as CIT A 8, Pune CCA; PARAMITA MANDAL BISWAS as CIT A-38, Delhi CCA;
PRABHAKANT as CIT DRP-2 Delhi-1, Delhi CCA; NAUSHEEN JAHAN ANSARI as Addl
DGIT TRG 2-NADT, Nagpur; RADHA RAMAN PATHAK CIT A-1, Rajkot CCA Gujarat;
SUNIL KUMAR as CIT A-2 Noida; SACHCHIDANAND SRIVASTAVA as CIT DR ITSC-1,
Mumbai CCA; RANJEET SINGH as CIT A-2, Rajkot; N JAYASANKAR as CIT A-1, Kochi;
M JAGDISH BABU as CIT DR ITAT-1, Hyderabad; INDER PAL SINGH BINDRA as CIT DR
AAR, Delhi CCA; SUCHISMITA PALAI as CIT A, Moradabad and PARMINDER as ADG,
Infrastructre-2, CBDT, Delhi.
IRS-CUSTOMS OFFICERS AT PRINCIPAL COMMISSIONER LEVEL TRANSFERRED

As many as 15 senior IRS officers in the grade of Principal Commissioner of Customs
and Central Excise have been transferred and posted to different places: JOHN JOSEPH
has been posted to PC, Nhava Sheva-I Cus Mumbai-II Cus with additional charge of CC,
Mumbai zone-II cus; PAWAN KUMAR JAIN is shifted to PC, CC AR Delhi; DEVENDRA
MISHRA was appointed to PC, Meerut CX; SANDEEP MOHAN BHATNAGAR has been
transferred to PC, Hyderabad-I, CX; S RAJKUMAR to PC Mysore Audit CX; RAJIV
TANDON to PC, Mumbai IMport-I Cus Mumbai zone-I cus; WILSON L HANGSHING to
Pr ADG, DG PM, Mumbai; MANORANJAN K to PC Delhi Cus Prev; BANKEY BEHARI to
Pc, Hyderabad Cus; DEBI PRASAD DASH to PrADG, DGRI Delhi Zu; AMRIT PAL SINGH
to PC, Mumbai ST-II; PRASANNA KUMAR DASH to PrADG, NACEN, Delhi; PULLELA
NAGESWARA RAO to PC, Cochin CX; SYED HYDER HASAN to PC, NOIDA-ICX; and
SUNGITA SHARMA posted to PrADG, DG Vigilance Mumbai ZU.

www.gfilesindia.com
...by the way

Gag order?
ne should not be surprised in the days to come if

all government servants remove their social media
accounts. They may also excuse themselves from
attending any inexpensive social function. Narendra
Modi is bent on tightening the so-called loose ends
within the civil services. On July 18, the Department of
Personnel issued a circular to all Chief Secretaries
asking for comments on an amendment in the All India
Service (Conduct) Rules 1968 by the second week of
August 2016. Now the proposed amendment to Rule 6
states, Connection with press or radio or television or
video or social/public mediaprevious sanction of the
Government shall not be required when the member of
the service, in the bonafide discharge of his duties or
otherwise, publishes a book or article or contributes to
or participates in any public media, including social
media websites. The proposed amendment further
adds, Criticism of Government.No member of the
Service shall, in any radio broadcast or communication
over any public media or in any document published
anonymously, pseudonymously or in his own name or
in the name of any other person or in any
communication to the press or in any public utterance,
make any statement of fact or opinion, i) which has the
effect of an adverse criticism of any current or recent
policy or action of the Central Government or a State
Government; or, ii) which is capable of embarrassing
the relations between the Central Government and any
State Government; or, iii) Which is capable of
embarrassing the relations between the Central
Government and the Government of any Foreign State:
Provided that nothing in this rule shall apply to any
statement made or views expressed by a member of the
Service in his official capacity and in the due
performance of the duties assigned to him? NOTE: The
member of service shall also not make any such
statement on television, social media or any other
communication application. The word Document
may also include a caricature. If one reads the
amendment carefully, no government servant can
express his/her personal opinion on any media as long
as he is in the service. The government has every right
to amend the rules but what action will be taken
against those political masters who keep on vitiating
the fabric of the nation? g
www.indianbuzz.com
Crossed wires
igital Indias mission is to transform the entire

ecosystem of public services through the use of
information technology. The Government of India has
launched the Digital India programme with the vision
to transform India into a digitally empowered society
and knowledge economy. The mission is being defied by
none other than a ministry headed by the Prime
Minister himself. The Personnel, Public Grievances and
Pensions is considered to be a very efficient ministry.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the Minister and dayto-day activities are monitored by the Minister of State,
Jitendra Singh. Its the cadre controlling ministry of
IAS officers. The ministry started communicating
digitally long ago. All circulars, notices, transfers
postings, training programmes are uploaded on its
website. The concerned ministries are also informed
digitally and sending notifications. Each document
issued by DoPT is marked to the National Informatics

Centre (NIC) and is expected to be uploaded and
updated same day in respective segments. The NIC,
however, behaves like the revenue department of a
district which works at its own speed and they really
dont care what the ministry has sent. There is a list of
339 Joint Secretaries who have been shifted in the last
two years but their postings and designations are more
than six months old whereas it should have been
updated on the same day. Even Executive Record sheets
of officers are outdated. The Parliament Question
section does not inform anything and always shows
error. Good intentions notwithstanding, Prime Minister
Modi is expected to at least make his ministry fully
Digital India compliant. g

61
...by the way
Khandelwal leads the challenge
Questionable appointment
hen high-profile Amitabh Kant, a 1980-batch

IAS officer of the Kerala cadre, moved to NITI
Ayog as CEO after retirement, it was expected that the
government will choose an efficient, hardworking and
honest officer for the Department of Industrial Policy
and Promotions (DIPP) as his successor. The
appointment of Ramesh Abhishek, a 1982-batch IAS
officer of the Bihar cadre and resident of Odisha, as
Secretary DIPP has surprised many upright civil
servants in Udyog Bhawan. Abhishek served as
Chairman of the
Forward Markets
Commission (FMC),
chief regulator of
commodity futures
markets in India,
for five years (20102015). It monitored
the National Spot Exchange Limited (NSEL) that is
today embroiled in a Rs 5,600-crore scandal,
allegedly swindling the money of investors. Given the
manner in which the NSEL was created, not only did
the Forward Markets Commission fail its primary
duties from the beginning, but it allegedly allowed the
scam to happen. Though Ramesh Abhishek claims
that he informed the government in 2012 itself about
the irregularities, but by that time millions had been
swindled. Spot trading operations on the exchange
were taking place 2008 but the first notice to NSEL
was sent in 2012, two years after Ramesh Abhishek
took over as FMC Chairman. Sources who are aware
of the operations of NSEL CMD Jignesh Shah
informed gfiles that Ramesh Abhishek was taken care
of by the NSEL establishment. It appears the
mandatory CVC and IB reports before appointing a
Secretary of DIPP, a very sensitive department, are
just an eyewash. g
62

he change of regime in Haryana has made some

officers persona non grata, especially those who
served with former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh
Hooda. KK Khandelwal, a 1985-batch officer of the
Haryana cadre, Additional Chief Secretary, Sports and
Youth Affairs, is a known name in Haryana. Well
qualified, Khandelwal is known as a fast-paced civil
servant among his colleagues. The change of guard did
not affect his morale and enthusiasm. He kept on
working on whatever job was assigned to him.
Manohar Lal Khattar was looking for an efficient civil
servant who could deliver results on the plan to
celebrate 50 years of Haryana as a golden jubilee year
from November 2016. Khattar started speaking
to many officers and spotted
Khandelwal as one who
ho
can deliver with speed.
d.
The only issue was he
had served as Additional
nal
Principal Secretary in
the previous regime.
Khattar discussed the
issue with
Khandelwal and
conveyed to him
that he is posing full
confidence in his
capabilities. Khattar called a cabinet meeting to discuss
which departments should take the lead in the
celebrations. It was decided that the Sports, Youth
Affairs and Culture Ministry should be given charge.
Both departments were separate and so it was decided
to club them and make one ministry of Sports, Youth
Affairs and Culture. Khandelwals name was
announced to head the ministry. It was a big honour
for Khandelwal. He did not lose time and sent a full
vision plan to the Chief Minister the very next day. A
separate authority Haryana Golden Jubilee
Celebrations Authority is being created. Khandewal is
on the job but he has to be wary of political pressures
to rope in non-professionals. g

www.gfilesindia.com
10
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POLITICS
SON RISE IN
CONGRESS p34
years
years
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Venod Sharma
Kunal Bhadoo
Congress MLA, Ambala
Hoodas son-in-law
KP Singh
Owner, BPTP
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JAPAN
ABEPLOMACY
JEFF KINGSTON
p76
gfilesindia.com
Haryanas
De facto
Chief
Ministers?
8
Kabul Chawla
February 10, 2014 `

Febr
VOL. 7, ISSUE 11
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Year
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Sameer Gehlaut
Arvind Walia
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Owner, Indiabulls
Owner, Ramprastha
Owner, Vatika Builders
63
Regn.No.DL(C)-14/1161/2016-2018 Licence No. U(C)-03/2016-17,

Licence to post without prepayment Posted on 7th & 8th of every month at SPM SRT Nagar,
Post Office, New Delhi 110055 R.N.I. No: DELENG/2007/19719.
`200, vol. 10, issue 5 | Date of Publication: 5/8/2016 | Pages 64
GOVERNANCE
AWARDS
2016
26-11-2016
AWARDS
64
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From the Editor

vol. 10, ISSUE 5 | AUGUST 2016

OME August 15, 2016, we will celebrate 70 years of Independent India.

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

sumitra leads the way, deals in

having a judicious mix of the existing

simhastha scam in madhya pradesh

catching up with bahuguna of

revisiting the mahatmas death

The existence of the land mafia is well

vp singh as prime minister

stay for the long run

haryana turns 50, dipp website

gfiles inside the government

The Modi governments integrated Civil

Might of the Speaker

OK Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan is a low-profile

Making deals in Haryana

lobby is being traumatised by tthe facilitator to

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

MJ digs into the files

VERYBODY knows Mobashar Jawad MJ Akbar as a journalist,

ODI Cabinets senior minister Nitin Gadkari is walking in hiss boss

gfiles inside the government

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

civil services challenges

NDIAS essential feature of democratic set-up includes a permanent

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

revenue during the Indira Gandhi

of democracy from village panchayat

The IAS had the most

UCH was the Steel Frame before

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

civil services challenges

repatriation is a sort of punishment

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

The present uncertainty

little idea about policy and no field

HE Steel Frame, which was

Unusual times for

F late, a number of civil servants

deliberates on high level appointments as each assignment is decided

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

civil services challenges

despite there being vacancies. They

T is learnt that the government is

gfiles inside the government

vol. 10, issue 5 | August 2016

The national association of

yet to be decided which is better for

tion is discernible in the senior ranks

gers has become their PDQWUD let the