Validating Vendetta
BY R.K.MISRA
Vendetta politics is the art of looking for trouble ,finding it
whether it exists or not ,and applying the wrong remedy, or so goes an oft
repeated saying.
Cold Delhi was sizzled on December 15
as the Central Bureau of Investigations(CBI) sought to ‘marinate’ the Delhi
Chief Minister’s Office in a controversial raid that saw temperatures soaring
in Parliament and fingers pointed at
Prime Minister Narendra Modi for resorting to such a practice. After Himachal
Pradesh ,this is the second Chief Minister or his office to be targeted by the
Narendra Modi led BJP government in it’s
less than two year long tenure.
Interestingly just around the time
that the CBI was pursuing the raid on the Delhi
chief minister’s office, far away in Gujarat’s capital of Gandhinagar ,a
court was issuing a bailable warrant against minister Purshottam Solanki in an
alleged Rs 400 crore fisheries scam during the time when he was a minister in
the government headed by chief minister
Narendra Modi .In fact two of his ministers figure in this case, the
other being Dilip Sanghani who was then agriculture minister.Solanki the then
minister of state for fisheries is currently state minister for animal
husbandry and cow protection in the Anandiben Patel government in Gujarat .The
Court had ruled that there was sufficient ground for proceeding and therefore a
criminal case be registered against
seven people including the ministers and a senior secretary of the
government.
The case involved giving
fishing contracts for 58 state reservoirs without the mandatory auctioning process
.In September 2008, the Gujarat High Court ordered scrapping of the contracts .When
tendered ,this time it fetched the government Rs 45 crores as against Rs 2.4 crores for the contracts granted by
the minister .The complainant had then moved the court seeking prosecution of
the minister.
The case erupted in a major political controversy in 2012 when the then
Governor Kamala Beniwal sanctioned prosecution of the minister .Rather than
taking a stern stand on an issue involving corruption, the Modi government in
Gujarat challenged the decision of the Governor in the High Court and faced the
ignominy of it’s arguments being rejected.
To cut a long story short, the Modi
government in Gujarat sought to give
primacy to politics over corruption when it best suited it so the past
record does not show up the
present acts in more charitable light .For good of 13 years that he ruled the
state ,journalists heard him fulminate against the UPA ruled centre, the state governor and what he would disparagingly call the
Congress Bureau of Investigations(CBI).The outpourings of the time sound so very hollow as he and his
government puts the very same
instruments of state power to use ,albeit
more ruthlessly .Numerous judicial commissions of inquiry were instituted when
public sentiments ran high but their
reports continue to gather dust with many yet to be tabled on the floor of the House though the preliminary reports were
milked to political advantage.To cite an example, the Nanavaty-Mehta Judicial Inquiry Commission
report on the Godhra carnage and the statewide communal riots that followed
thereafter.
Without going into the merits or
demerits of the National Herald case, the fact remains that Himanshu Kumar Lal,
a 2003 batch IPS officer of the Orissa cadre who was on deputation as joint director of the
Enforcement Department had recommended
closure of the case.He was summarily
shunted out to the UIDAI for the remaining part of his deputation .R.S.Katoch
who was holding additional charge of the ED and had only days earlier received
a three month extension was suddenly divested of it and Karnal Singh brought in
as special director to take charge .This was done after Subramanian Swamy
sought the Prime Minister’s intervention in the matter .The Centre had only
last month backtracked on its stand
endorsing prosecution of Swamy for allegedly making hate speeches .It stated
that the affidavit filed by the union
Home Ministry in the Supreme Court does not reflect its stand.
Lal is not the first officer to be shunted out .Nor will he be the
last .When Modi took over in Gujarat five IAS officers were summarily sent into
‘wilderness’ for the perceived sin of being seen to be close to his own party
patriarch and predecessor ,Keshubhai Patel .Three of them subsequently quit
service .Even in the period thereafter those who have dared to oppose ,even
differ have faced a similar fate .The list is long .It begins with DGPs(now retired)
Kuldip Sharma and R.B.Sreekumar .Sharma had recommended prosecution of his minister(Home) Amit Shah, now BJP chief
while Sreekumar was sidelined and superseded for opposing Assembly elections
after the 2002 riots before the chief election commissioner J.M.Lyngdoh .He had
stated that the atmoasphere was too communally surcharged for polls ,the
precise reason why Modi wanted it to romp home on polarized sentiment.He was
superseded but sought judicial
intervention to get his position and pay
.Two serving IGPs, Satish Verma and
Rajnish Rai,were shunted out of the state on ‘penal’ postings immediately after
the change of guard in Delhi .Verma had under High Court directions assisted
investigation in the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case while Rai
probing the Sohrabuddin fake encounter case under apex court directions
had arrested three IPS officers including DIG Vanzara .It finally led to the arrest
of Home minister Amit Shah who spent extended time in prison before being
bailed out and was finally taken off the
hook after the BJP government came to
power in Delhi.
Sharma’s brother Pradip Sharma, an IAS officer has been in and out of prison with fresh
charges being filed every time he travels up to the apex court and manages bail
.These are just to name a few .Similarly there is a long list of officers who
have been rewarded for services to ’king’ and ‘crown’. By last count there are
about 28 of them doing duty in Delhi with at least three more to add to the numbers soon.
Hell hath no fury than a Modi scorned
.It is common knowledge that during his tenure in Gujarat ,in the aftermath of
the 2002 communal riots that followed the Godhra carnage, the then chief minister had to face maximum
problems at the hands of the judiciary
and certain NGOs. Most of the
litigational forays which were turned into ‘prestige’ issues by the state
government ,reportedly on account of his
defiant stand came a cropper whether it
was in the matter of the lokayukta case ,sharing of lions with MP or the lax
investigations into the 2002 communal riots cases .
Those who have followed him
closely over the years know that Modi does not forgive and forget easily .For
him a friend can do no wrong and an enemy can do no right .And also that he does not duck a fight nor
hesitate to change things to suit his requirements come what may. It is
therefore not farfetched to see the changes
sought to be brought in the higher judiciary through the NJAC
legislation or the retributive onslaught
of the administration that Teesta Setalvad
and her likes are facing .By the same yardstick those who opposed her
and Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) leader Medha Patkar ,to name a few ,have been
rewarded for their efforts .Shahrukh Khan gets badgered for a mere statement
that the country is becoming a tad too
intolerant and soon finds himself staring at the wrong end of the official
barrel .Again Leela Samson is set to face an enquiry for the period she was the
director of the renowned bharatnatyam centre ,Kalashetra for ‘unfruitful
expenditure’ at the hands of the Mahesh Sharma led union culture ministry .The
right honourable minister is credited with the famous line that ‘Despite being
a muslim President Kalam was a nationalist’ and gets rewarded with the bungalow
occupied by the former President.
It would be in order for those in high
places to pause and ponder for the
politics of vendetta is the only scrip that guarantees manifold ‘returns’ .What
goes around ,eventually comes around.
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