18 September 2003
Scam II
ANOTHER OFFICER REWARDED FOR CORRUPTION!
From Jal Khambata
NEW DELHI: Giving company to Minerals and Metals Trading Corporation (MMTC)
Chairman S D Kapoor rewarded with extension despite indictment in a Basmati
rice export scam (as exclusively reported by us) is another bureaucrat
implicated in a Rs 32-crore fraud who has been coroneted to head yet another
public sector firm.
He is Arvind Pandalai, Chairman and Managing Director of the State Trading
Corporation (STC) who put the government firm to the huge loss in Soyabean
extraction operations.
Arvind not only survived without suspension for full five years after
detection of the fraud, but he also flourished as Director-Marketing of STC
though on probation all these years in view of the ongoing inquiries against
him.
The stigma of the fraud and corruption was, however, erased overnight and a
clean chit was given to him in October last year to give him the additional
charge of the CMD without even the approval of the Cabinet Committee on
Appointments (CCA).
It was, however, only after nine months that the Public Enterprises
Selection Board (PESB) actually selected Arvind Pandalai for the post and
sent the recommendation to the CCA for its formal approval. The Board just
overlooked all the stigmas attached to him and even ignored a letter written
by a MP member on the Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertaking on July
15 this year expressing surprise at Arvind functioning as the STC CMD.
The favour has been showered on Arvind again by the same Commerce Ministry
that had given extension to the MMTC chairman ignoring the CVC report. STC
and MMTC roll in money and hence there should be no surprise if someone
gains in return for the favour shown to their top bosses.
Arvind's probation as the Director-Marketing was not cleared during full
five years of tenure only because of the serious charge under investigation
against him. But it was cleared overnight and a Joint Secretary (Vigilance)
in the Commerce Ministry quickly gave him a clean chit in the Rs 32-crore
fraud to let him take over as the CMD and that too on a Saturday (5.10.2002)
without the CCA approval.
It was on February 5, 1998 that the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) issued
orders to look into a complaint against Arvind Pandalai for causing a loss
of Rs 32 crores to STC in the Soyabean extraction operations.
Two investigations, one by Executive Director (Vigilance) of STC and another
by a Joint Secretary of the Commerce Ministry, fixed the total
responsibility of Rs 32 crores on him. The first investigation report is
dated August 10, 1998 while the second investigation report is dated January
15, 1999.
Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) also indicted him in its report in
2001, pointing out "major lapses" on the part of the corporate office where
Arvind was incharge of the Soyabean extraction operations.
CVC also asked the Commerce Ministry to impose a "major penalty" on him for
this fraud in which 15 officers are still facing inquiry while one senior
officer has ben demoted and another six officers' residences were raided by
the CBI.
The Parliamentary Committee on Public Undertakings is still probing this
fraud.
The probation of Arvind as Director-Marketing could not be regularised
because of this inquiry but the Commerce Ministry quietly extended it
without the CVC clearance or CCA approval.
At a meeting attended by chairmen of various Public Sector Undertakings
(PSU) in Delhi in December last year, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee
was shedding tears at the anner in which rules governing appointments in the
PSUs are flouted and stressed the need to closely monitor top-notch PSU
appointments.
Vajpayee, however, found nothing wrong while presiding over a CCA meeting
recently when the proposal of PSEB came before it to approve selection of
Arvind Pandalai as the STC chairman and managing director. No questions were
asked on how and who washed away his corruption charge or who will pay for
the loss of Rs 32 crores he inflicted on the STC.
In this episode, the institution of the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC)
becomes a laughing stock as it keeps crying about corruption in high places
but the concerned ministries just dump all his investigations to shower
favours on the very persons who should have been prosecuted and put behind
the bar.
This is the sad tale of so many CVC investigations. The CVC, and the CBI
under him, indict the officials but they cannot straightaway take the
culprits to court. It requires permission of the concerned ministry. The
bureaucrats sitting in the ministries find fault with the CVC and CBI
findings and let off the culprits with minor punishment or at times with big
rewards as has been in the case of Arvind Pandalai.
All that the CVC can do is to keep writing stinging notes to the Ministry and the CBI keep asking
for permission to prosecute while it is the corrupt who have the last laugh.
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