Kapil Sibal's two-part article in HT is full of myths and misconceptions
June 30 2011
Kapil Sibal’s two-part article in the Hindustan Times (‘A free-floating entity’ and ‘Up the garden path’) trashing Team Anna’s version of the Lokpal Bill is breathtaking in its sweeping comments. Had he not been an eminent lawyer that he is one would have dismissed him for being political with the attendant licence to spread lies to deceive the citizens. But being an eminent lawyer, he needs to be questioned for writing an eminently trash-able article.
Here is a list of his half-truths, untruths, myths and misconceptions about our constitution and parliamentary democratic set-up vis-à-vis the Jan Lokpal Bill:
Sibal repeatedly describes the Jan Lokpal as a body of “11 unelected wise men”, “unelected executive body” etc. The emphasis is on “unelected”.
If such is the sanctity of the election, why isn’t he asking the “topmost executive” of the land, the prime minister, to get elected first? The PM is not only “unelected” for seven years running he is “unelectable” too. Shouldn’t he begin his crusade against the PM first for violating the “essence of parliamentary democracy”? How does he stand the topmost executive of the country who is no more than a “nominated” person?
Besides, which of these authorities wielding immense power is elected – CJI, CJs of high courts, judges of high courts and supreme courts, lower judiciary, DGPs, CBI director, CVC?
Sibal says, “The judiciary seeks to protect citizens. The (Jan) Lokpal seeks to prosecute them”.
Why, pray, has the government prepared the Judicial Accountability Bill? Why the impeachment move against Justice Soumitra Sen? Why is the CBI trying to prosecute Justice Nirmal Yadav of the Punjab and Haryana high court in the cash-for-judgment scam? Why a probe has been ordered against former CJI KG Balakrishanan for amassing disproportionate assets?
Sibal says Jan Lokpal “seeks to arrogate to itself the power to discipline government servants” and that it will require a “mammoth machinery” to deal with corruption acts of about 10-12 million government servants.
But then what is the purpose of the Prevention of Corruption Act and other such laws and bodies like the CBI and the CVC? How are they managing to discipline 10-12 million government servants? The Jan Lokpal seeks merger of the CBI and CVC with itself, so why will it need “mammoth machinery”?
Sibal also says the constitution “protects the tenure” of government servants and hence it would need constitutional amendment if disciplinary power is given to the Jan Lokpal.
Is this the reason why our anti-corruption machinery has failed? Then, please immediately amend the constitution.
Surely, the Congress is not afraid of constitutional amendments. Indira Gandhi did it with impunity, suspending our fundamental rights, cut to size the apex court by imposing her own man as CJI, cut down powers of the higher judiciary during the Emergency. Rajiv Gandhi tried to gag the media. Did Sibal as much as wince once, even if in private, when these draconian laws were being made? Did he ever protest against Emergency and suspension of our fundamental rights?
Sibal says Jan Lokpal is seeking to prosecute MPs who are protected by the constitution to vote and speak freely in parliament.
Does the constitution protect the MPs to take bribes to vote? Does he support exoneration of the MPs involved in the JMM bribery case? And what pray has happened to the more recent cash-for-votes scam? Was it protected by the constitution too? Do you regret that about a dozen MPs were thrown out for taking money to ask questions?
Sibal is against Jan Lokpal having power to intercept telephone conversations.
Surely, a Jan Lokpal didn’t bug finance minister Pranab Mukherjee. The Niira Radia taps were also not the handiwork of the Jan Lokpal. What does this talk of the system that Sibal is so zealously trying to protect?
Sibal says Lokpal will prosecute judiciary too.
This is mischievous to say the least. All Lokpal will have is the power to sanction investigation against a judge. Cases will be tried in the special courts and be subject to review of the high court and supreme court. The problem with the present system is a judge caught in a corruption case can’t be investigated without the court’s permission and that is why Justice Nirmal Yadav was allowed to retire peacefully. Will a similar mechanism to sanction investigation not be part of the Judicial Accountability Bill?
And finally,
Sibal says “some eminent jurists believe it might fall foul of the basic structure of the constitution” and that it is “answerable to none” (government, parliament and judiciary).
Really? Will the Lokpal not be debated in and passed by the parliament?
And to say it is answerable to none is absurd.
Answerable to the government: Since all answerable anti-corruption mechanism has failed, the idea is to set up a body “independent” of the government.
Answerable to parliament: Just as parliamentary committees oversee work of CVC, PSUs, a similar mechanism can be applicable to the Lokpal. Besides, annual report of the Lokpal can also be tabled in parliament on which debates etc can be conducted. Simple, isn’t it, Mr Sibal?
Answerable to judiciary: Since all decisions of the Lokpal will be subjected to review of the high court and then supreme court, it will be subjected to the judiciary. Isn’t it?
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Ramesh signs RIP for FRA and other write ups
Hands over third defective clearance to Posco
May 02 2011
Posco got its “first” final clearance from the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) on December 29, 2009, which came attached with 28 conditions.
The “second” final clearance was received on January 31, 2011, which came attached with “additional” 61 conditions.
The “third” final clearance has been given today (May 2, 2011). The old conditions remain. One new condition is added (Posco to bear the cost of regeneration of an equivalent amount of open, degraded forest land), but it effectively buries the Forest Rights Act (FRA) of 2006.
The project needed two additional final clearances precisely because the project affected people said their forest rights had not been granted – a mandatory provision of the FRA.
Today’s order makes FRA irrelevant.
In his order, Ramesh quotes how the state government has said in its report that (a) the “palli sabha” resolution about non-settlement of FRA is defective on technical grounds – set procedures were not following to hold the meeting and adopt the resolution and (b) that there are no tribals in the area or anyone who can put forward credible claims about living and depending on forests for livelihood for 75 years.
The state government’s report is contrary to the findings of two high-powered committees appointed by Ramesh himself – Meena Gupta committee and Naresh Saxena committee. Both said FRA had not been implemented.
Ramesh overcomes this problem in a novel way. He says he has three options – (i) seek legal opinion, (ii) institute independent inquiry or (iii) repose faith in state government.
He opts for the third, saying: “Faith and trust in what the state government says is an essential pillar of cooperative federation which is why I rejected the second option.” He conveniently forgets that he had sent two inquiry teams earlier.
His rejection of the first option is technical – that two-third of members didn’t sign the palli sabha resolutions, that the sarpanch convened the meetings, instead of the palli sabha and that the resolutions were not part of the book specifically provided for this purpose.
This means, the forest rights issue remains unresolved. Technical flaws don’t mean negation of rights. Secondly, the state government denies forest rights without providing evidence or justification.
It is well known that land records of the area have not been updated after 1947. Most of the people lost their land documents during the supercyclone of 1999, which devastated the entire block - Ersama in Jagatsinghpur district. A few still carry land rights issued to them by the local rulers before 1947. The area once was covered with mangroves that the supercyclone destroyed.
Ramesh accepts the state government’s assertion on face value.
He knows he is on the wrong. Therefore, he goes on to say:
“I want to address the question of whether my decision will weaken the implementation of the Forest Rights Act, 2006. To these critics I would answer that it was my personal insistence that in August 2009 the MoEF made adherence to the FRA an essential pre-requisite for allowing diversion of forest land for non-forestry purposes under the Forest Conservation Act, 1980.
“I was under no obligation or pressure to do so except my own commitment to FRA, 2006. The implementation of both the FRA, 2006 and the August 2009 guideline is a learning and an evolving process since we are still in largely unchartered territory. The Ministry of Environment and Forests will continue to upgrade and improve the process to ensure compliance with the law in letter and in spirit.”
This is a dubious argument. Enforcement of the forest rights is a legal and binding requirement. Not a discretionary power of Ramesh or his ministry, as he is suggesting. And his promise is nothing but deception.
Field report by NAC member Naresh Saxena has established how implementation of forest rights by the state governments is defective. Many have been denied their rights because the state governments and the forest departments are less than honest in their approach.
Ramesh has only given more room for the bungling state governments like Orissa to play with people's rights. He seems unaware that the objective of bringing in the FRA was to correct the "historical injustice" to the tribals and other forest dwellers.
***
What Anna Hazare wantsHis fast-unto-death may be way to ensure greater say for people in policy-making
April 08 2011
The indefinite fast by 72-year-old social activist Anna Hazare is the beginning of a new phenomenon, which is, insistence of the civil society to have a decisive say in the way laws and policies are framed and finalised in the country. His fight is as much to bring about this shift as to fight corruption.
For quite some time, civil society activists, including some of the National Advisory Council members like Aruna Roy and RTI activist Arvind Kejriwal have been asking the government to conduct pre-legislative, pre-policy formulation consultations with people in whose name such policies and laws are made. The government has ignored it.
The immediate provocation for Hazare to go on fast is to force the government to bring in an apex corruption watchdog, the Lokpal. For 42 long years, the government has been dithering on the Lokpal on of some or other pretext. Eight bills introduced in Lok Sabha ever since such a proposal was made by the administrative reforms commission headed by Morarji Desai in 1996 have lapsed. The real reason is, however, the reluctance of the political and administrative executive to subject themselves to a powerful watchdog.
Why Hazare wants redrafting of the Lokpal Bill
The latest draft of the Lokpal Bill is a toothless recommendatory body with no suo motu power to inquire into corruption. It only covers the political executive but not the bureaucracy.
Hazare and his associates want several changes. One, they want Lokpal to have suo motu power to register FIR, investigate and prosecute the suspects. Two, it should be an independent, permanent and constitutional body. Three, appointment of the Lokpal should involve consultation with people and transparent.
Why government is not willing
To begin with, the political parties don’t want a powerful corruption watchdog. Secondly, they don’t want people’s involvement in policy and law formulation as that would, they fear, encroach on their job of legislating laws and making policies.
Why Hazare is upset with GoM on Lokpal
Hazare has questioned the motive of the government by saying that since the GoM includes ministers who have serious corruption charges against them, including Sharad Pawar, he doesn’t expect the GoM to do an honest job.
What he wants
He wants equal representation of the civil society in the committee to redraft the bill. The ruling Congress party has dismissed this suggestion saying that there is no such precedent and it encroaches on the legislative’s domain.
Why the government said his fast is premature and unnecessary
This is ridiculous. Hazare was to go on fast on March 5. He deferred it for a month when the prime minister intervened. He went ahead with fast because he was unsatisfied with the response of the prime minister in his subsequent meeting. Besides, the demand for Lokpal has been going on since 1966. So, his demand is netiher premature nor unnecessary, especially when the UPA II government is beseized with several massive corruption cases - 2G scam, CWG scam, Isro spectrum scam, Adarsh scam and so on.
***
Fibbing on Lokpal may not work…now that Baba Ramdev’s fast seems imminent
May 31 2011
The stage is set for another round of battle of wits on corruption. Two months after Anna Hazare’s fast jolted the government into action, Baba Ramdev is starting another round of indefinite fast from June 4 at the Ramlila grounds in New Delhi. And going by the way the government has tackled the Lokpal Bill issue that emerged as the rallying point of the Anna’s fast, it seems more trouble is waiting for the government.
Given the advance notice Baba Ramdev gave about his plan of action, it would have been wiser for the government to have sorted out the Lokpal issue by now. In contrast it has hardened its stance, which would only mean a bigger public support for Baba Ramdev, with Anna and his team joining him in the battle to fight corruption.
Monday’s meeting between the government’s representatives and Anna’s saw the former insisting on keeping the judiciary, prime minister, members of parliament and bureaucrats below the rank of joint secretary out of Lokpal’s jurisdiction. This legitimized Justice Santosh Hegde’s question to the government about who should then be covered by the Lokpal. Interestingly, the government’s own formulation of the Lokpal until now had the prime minister and the members of parliament in the ambit of the Lokpal. So why this dilution now? The only logical answer to that is the old reluctance of the politicians not to subject themselves to any anti-corruption mechanism.
But if such a stand had helped the politicians put the Lokpal off for the past 42 years, it is unlikely to do so now. Anna and his colleagues from the civil society have now threatened to walk out in protest. They know Baba Ramdev’s fast will provide them another platform to whip up public sentiments against corruption beginning with Saturday. It will be the government which will be painted to the wall again.
To be sure, the government is desperate to prevent Baba Ramdev from sitting on fast. They know the down side and hence an attempt to placate him. Last Saturday it announced setting up a committee under the CBDT chairman to examine ways to curb black money. The next day, it commissioned a study by top economists to estimate the extent of black money stashed abroad. On Monday, it announced a Directorate of Criminal Investigation to deal with criminal matters punishable under the direct tax law under the CBDT, which will function in eight high wealth generating cities of the country.
But these measures have failed to impress Baba Ramdev, and rightly so. This government, as indeed the case with previous governments, has the habit of setting up committees to be seen as doing something without actually meaning to do anything to fight corruption or the black money menace. The way the supreme court forced the government to act in cases relating to the 2G spectrum and CWG scams and the Hasan Ali case in recent times is ample evidence of this lack of intent on part of the government.
Baba Ramdev’s fast later this week, therefore, would severely test the government’s mettle and propensity to deceive the public on all matters relating to corruption. The bigger question, however, is if the yoga guru will be able to take the agenda set by Anna Hazare to its logical conclusion.
Keeping the Lokpal at bay and other write ups
Keeping the Lokpal at bay
The dirty tricks department is working overtime
April 18 2011
The dirty tricks department of the Congress and the government it leads is out in the full force. Look at the speed with which it has acted to discredit Anna Hazare and his associates in the drafting committee on Lokpal bill personally. The real motive is to discredit the anti-corruption crusade and through it, the move to set up the Lokpal.
In quick succession, property deals and a CD involving the father-son duo in the committee – Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan – are out, raising doubts about their credentials. Former Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh, who last surfaced at the time of the cash-for-votes scam in 2008, is back in action. True or false, the charges against the Bhushans shift the focus to their personalities, away from their cause. Predictably, they will be busy fighting their personal battles for the next few months. The plan seems simple: 'Throw enough dirt and some will stick'.
Anna, of course, has been the target right from the beginning. He was derided for undermining democracy for saying that he doesn’t want to fight election because he will lose his deposit if he does. "(People) Take Rs 100 and vote, take bottle of wine to vote, an election costs Rs 6-7 crore," he had said. Those backing the politicians in the fight against corruption turned it on its head and said this reflected what faith he had in democracy. The naivety was touching, as if Anna had made a shocking revelation to us, even if it may not be the whole truth.
Veteran Congress leader Digvijay Singh has been after Anna tirelessly. He found fault with Anna for praising Narendra Modi for his rural development projects, questioned money mobilised and spent on organising the dharna and also questioned his association with RSS. He even asked for inclusion of NGOs in the Lokpal’s ambit.
Now, Anna has been made to repose his faith in parliament and its supremacy. He was last heard replying to a question about his stand in case the parliament rejected the Lokpal bill. He said it would be acceptable to him. It may seem the right thing to say but make no mistake. The politicians will hold it up to him and the rest of us if the Lokpal bill falls through.
The historical evidence of past 42 years shows that that may indeed be the case. Eight Lokpal bills have come before the parliament, the highest democratic institution of the country, and yet, failed to pass the muster. Now that Anna has endorsed parliament’s right to reject, the Congressmen and other politicians would be laughing their hearts out.
The Congress, having been in power for the larger part of free India, knows how to keep an inconvenient law at bay. There are enough “allies” whose services can be used at the right time to shout down the law in parliament on some ground or the other.
Yes, indeed, the motive of the politicians, particularly those in power, is suspect and that is why we don’t have an effective mechanism to fight corruption in the first place. The crusade is against that very intention. And don’t doubt, even for a moment, the politicians’ capacity to manipulate their way through.
***
Manmohan and Sonia long on rhetoric, short on delivery
Their assurances on good governance and fighting corruption doesn’t match by facts on ground
May 23 2011
Presenting his government’s report card on completion of two years of its second term on Sunday the prime minister said, referring to the spate of scams, that his government was “determined to take corrective action”.
UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to echoed the sentiment by adding that “transparency, accountability and probity are at the very heart of our governance, our actions and we demonstrate this”.
These are reassuring words, except that there is little substance in what is being said.
If both the prime minister and the UPA chairperson were referring to actions against A Raja, Suresh Kalmadi, Hassan Ali, Kanimozhi and others, it may be pointed out that in each of these cases it was the supreme court which pressed for action, not the government.
For example, Raja was removed from office only after the supreme court demanded to know why he was continuing in office long after the 2G spectrum scam had blown in the face of the government. Similarly, in the case of the Hassan Ali, accused of stashing money in tax havens abroad and a tax defaulter, the government acted after the apex court asked “what the hell is going on in this country”.
Had the government been sincere, it would have acted much earlier when the scams came to notice. Raja was reappointed telecom minister in 2009 and Kalmadi continued to be CWG organising committee chairman long after their wrongdoings had come to light.
Investigations into the 2G spectrum scam have also thrown up names of some top corporate honchos and other personalities, who are yet to be proceeded against.
Even on the Lokpal bill, which envisages setting up an anti-corruption watchdog, the government showed little interest until Anna Hazare forced its hand by sitting on a fast unto death. The government’s lack of sincerity in battling corruption was exposed in the way P J Thomas, a bureaucrat against whom a criminal charge sheet was pending for 20 years, was appointed the central vigilance commissioner in spite of the protest from the leader of opposition, Sushma Swaraj, who was a member of the selection panel. The government continued to defend Thomas’ appointment even in the supreme court when a PIL was filed. It was the court which sent Thomas packing.
There is little on the ground to suggest that the government has done anything to improve governance or check corruption. Or bring back the black money stashed abroad.
***
Making a hash of its mandate
IIT-Roorkee's study is counterproductive
June 27 2011
The first ever cumulative impact assessment (CIA) study of hydro-power projects being built on Bhagirathi and Alaknanda, two tributaries of river Ganga, has come as a big disappointment.
Carried out by the Alternate Hydro Energy Centre (AHEC) of IIT (Roorkee), which submitted its report to the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) recently, the study ignores the very raison d’être of its endeavour – assess cumulative impact of 70 hydro-power projects (HPs) commissioned or in various stages of development (three of which were scrapped last year) on these rivers, their surrounding ecosystems and human habitations along the rivers. Of the 70, 54 are run-of-the-river (ROR) and the rest storage-based projects.
The task was onerous and yet important to make sure the drive to harness hydro-power doesn’t kill the rivers and the life-sustaining environment they build around them. In fact, it was prompted by a supreme court order of 2009 to allay such fears and came in the wake of scrapping three major HPs – at Loharinag Pala, Pala Maneri and Bhaironghati on Bhagirathi river. But the findings not only fail to live up to the expectations, they do a reverse swing and advocate more such projects.
Here are some of the key issues involved in the study, the findings and what’s wrong with these findings.
* Both Bhagirathi and Alaknand originate from glaciers and so do several of their tributaries. The report says glaciers are in much higher altitudes, upstream and distant to be affected by the HPs.
Right, but it doesn’t take into consideration the crucial fact that 75 percent of Himalayan glaciers are retreating at an annual rate of 3.75 percent. This was revealed in the “most detailed” satellite-imagery based study “Snow and glaciers of the Himalayas” carried out jointly by the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) and Department of Space. Though this particular report was released in June this year, similar findings have been published in the past too.
The study doesn't take into consideration how much less water will flow in over the next five, 10 or 15 years and how that would impact the existing hydro-power projects. Prudence demands that such information are taken into consideration while planning or assessing projects.
*A dam (storage-based project) submerges part of the river and run-of-the-river project diverts a part of it, thus “affecting” the river. Talking about diversion, the report says “the river becomes dry in the diverted stretch” which could be “very long” and “fatal to aquatic life”, besides depriving water to people on the banks. Submergence too has an adverse impact.
The report goes on to point out that the existing HPs would affect 47.3 percent of Bhagirathi and its tributaries and 43.9 percent of Alaknand and its tributaries. While failing to assess what the cumulative impact would be on the rivers and their tributaries, the report proposes "a threshold, say 70 percent, may be fixed" for this, meaning that a river may be allowed to be submerged or diverted up to 70 percent of its length.
Shockingly, the study doesn’t say on what basis this threshold has been arrived at. Taken singly, the report points out, 70.71 percent of Bhagirathi river is affected (31% diverted, 39% submerged), yet it goes on to advocate for revival of the Loharinag Pala project and others on the same river which were scrapped last year.
* The study recognizes the fact that all HPs adversely impact the river and its aquatic life and hence it should get a breathing space between the dams/barrages “so that the river is given an opportunity to recuperate its ecological environment”. But what should this breathing space be or whether adequate breathing space has been provided in the existing projects has not been spelt out.
* The study recognizes that HPs restrict flow of rivers and that to keep the rivers and their ecosystems in good health and sustain human livelihood and wellbeing certain quantity of water should “always flow in the rivers”. It describes this flow as “environmental flow” but bases its calculations on the “minimum flow” required, ignoring needs and expectations of people living on the banks, a flow required to help flora and fauna to prosper and flourish, and not just survive and the fact that floods too have important ecological functions.
While proposing a minimum flow, the report acknowledges that this may reduce power generation and “such reduction may make several schemes unviable, especially small scale hydropower schemes”. Yet, it doesn’t say if we should scrap more projects to account to prevent this. On the contrary it concludes that hydro-power can be harnessed with environmental sustainability “provided certain measures are taken”. What these measures are, we are not told.
This part of the study also suffers from “a major handicap” as “measured river cross sections and velocity of flows were available at limited locations”. It goes on to say that the desired “building block method” which should be applied to arrive at the right environmental flow “requires much more data, time and manpower and other resources and therefore, could not be applied in this study”.
* The study registers negative changes in water quality but gives a thumbs-up saying that the impact is well within the limits of environmental sustainability. This assessment is based on individual case studies, rather than the combined impact of a series of projects. Experts point out that the thumbs-up is based on Centre for Pollution Control Board’s “use-based” classification of water which may be okay to determine potability of water drawn from a tube well but not for determining water quality of a natural river.
* The study admits that Bhagirathi and Alaknanda river basins are rich in biodiversity “designated as sensitive habitats” with “high conservation significance”. It also says that construction of reservoirs prevents migration of aquatic life and changes the domain of flowing water (river) to a standing water (lake) domain. This change brings about “significant changes in physic-chemical characteristics affecting the ecological parameters.
But it goes on to conclude: “So far, we don’t have any study of changes in aquatic life from river to reservoir. Thus, at present it is not possible to give any firm assessment on the impact of HPs on biodiversity of Alaknand and Bhagirathi.” But wasn’t that the purpose of the study?
It devotes considerable space to impact on fishes, particularly the famed golden mahseer and snow trout that so characterize these rivers by observing that the fishes “require an uninterrupted riverine habitat as well as floodplains for their breeding”, which dams and tunnels disrupt. And by way of solution, it says “fish passes” of various kinds be used. But not a word has been said about the efficacy of these passes and instances where such methods have been used successfully to make a convincing argument.
The only worthwhile suggestion the report contains is that no more HPs should be set up on the tributaries of Bhagirathi and Alaknand. It sys: “These streams have been identified as Nayar, Birhi Ganga, Bhyunder Ganga, Balganga and Asiganga which should not be exploited further as these are the lifelines of the main ecosystem of Alaknanda and Bhagirathi rivers”.
* The study points out that tunneling work for ROR projects damage springs and other underground water channels. This alters water availability and effects local population. But in a typical bureaucratic exercise, it says such blockages would lead to springs finding alternate routes and that the reservoirs being built in other projects would recharge ground water to conclude that the effect will be localized and the cumulative impact will be negligible. And then it goes on to contradict itself: “In the absence of relevant groundwater in the project scenario it may be difficult (or improper) to conclude with confidence on the impact on construction of HPs on the availability of drinking water sources to the population in the project area”.
* Photographs carried in the report tell a harrowing tale of recklessness. Huge piles of muck, generated from excavation work, have been dumped in the river beds, skirting the water flow and in forested areas of hills destroying vegetation. Instead of expressing anxiety and asking for immediate remedial action to prevent damage to the river and forests, it merely advises that suitable dumping ground may be found.
Worse, it points out that afforestation and catchment area treatment has not started for any of the HPs and that post construction impact data are not available. Yet, it concludes that “the problems generated during the construction “will die out automatically”.
* The study is dotted with lamentations about lack of data and relevant information. The chapter on “recommendations” begins with this gem: “In view of the fact that the field of cumulative impact assessment (CIA) is new and is being introduced for the first time in India, there are many gaps in the knowledge necessary to undertake CIA with the desired degree of precision, particularly in the Himalayan region where the database is weaker than that in the rest of the country. It is therefore necessary that a major programme of research and development should be drawn and implemented as early as possible.”
Bharat Jhunjhunwala, former professor of IIM-Bangalore whose petition to the central empowered committee (CEC) led to the supreme court ordering this cumulative study in 2009, says the basic mistake of the study is to define cumulative impact more in terms of sustainable development in long term and less in terms of combined impact of more than one project taken together.
He goes on to add that AHEC has failed to include several impacts in its study: loss of forests and biodiversity, trapping of sediments in reservoirs, methane emissions from reservoir, impact on health due to mosquito breeding in reservoirs and so on.
In fact, when IIT-Roorkee was given the task by the MoEF, he had objected to the choice of both the organization and its director Arun Kumar, saying that their primary competence was in engineering and design of small hydropower projects, rather than environmental studies. He would have preferred if the task had been given to NEERI, Wildlife Institution of India or Forest Research Institute.
Himanshu Thakkar, an expert on water management issues, dismisses the report as “pathetic” and says he is planning to write to the environment minister Jairam Ramesh to junk it.
He finds several major flaws: lamentations about lack of relevant data which was its job to provide, a pronounced bias for hydropower projects, absence of cumulative impact study of key indicators, silence on restrictions to ensure bio-diversity and ecological stability and several others. He is particularly disturbed with the IIT-Roorkee’s prescription of letting 70 percent of the river length be affected. He says a river gets killed in two ways – submergence and diversion – adding, “So to allow killing of 70 percent of a river is nonsense”.
The dirty tricks department is working overtime
April 18 2011
The dirty tricks department of the Congress and the government it leads is out in the full force. Look at the speed with which it has acted to discredit Anna Hazare and his associates in the drafting committee on Lokpal bill personally. The real motive is to discredit the anti-corruption crusade and through it, the move to set up the Lokpal.
In quick succession, property deals and a CD involving the father-son duo in the committee – Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan – are out, raising doubts about their credentials. Former Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh, who last surfaced at the time of the cash-for-votes scam in 2008, is back in action. True or false, the charges against the Bhushans shift the focus to their personalities, away from their cause. Predictably, they will be busy fighting their personal battles for the next few months. The plan seems simple: 'Throw enough dirt and some will stick'.
Anna, of course, has been the target right from the beginning. He was derided for undermining democracy for saying that he doesn’t want to fight election because he will lose his deposit if he does. "(People) Take Rs 100 and vote, take bottle of wine to vote, an election costs Rs 6-7 crore," he had said. Those backing the politicians in the fight against corruption turned it on its head and said this reflected what faith he had in democracy. The naivety was touching, as if Anna had made a shocking revelation to us, even if it may not be the whole truth.
Veteran Congress leader Digvijay Singh has been after Anna tirelessly. He found fault with Anna for praising Narendra Modi for his rural development projects, questioned money mobilised and spent on organising the dharna and also questioned his association with RSS. He even asked for inclusion of NGOs in the Lokpal’s ambit.
Now, Anna has been made to repose his faith in parliament and its supremacy. He was last heard replying to a question about his stand in case the parliament rejected the Lokpal bill. He said it would be acceptable to him. It may seem the right thing to say but make no mistake. The politicians will hold it up to him and the rest of us if the Lokpal bill falls through.
The historical evidence of past 42 years shows that that may indeed be the case. Eight Lokpal bills have come before the parliament, the highest democratic institution of the country, and yet, failed to pass the muster. Now that Anna has endorsed parliament’s right to reject, the Congressmen and other politicians would be laughing their hearts out.
The Congress, having been in power for the larger part of free India, knows how to keep an inconvenient law at bay. There are enough “allies” whose services can be used at the right time to shout down the law in parliament on some ground or the other.
Yes, indeed, the motive of the politicians, particularly those in power, is suspect and that is why we don’t have an effective mechanism to fight corruption in the first place. The crusade is against that very intention. And don’t doubt, even for a moment, the politicians’ capacity to manipulate their way through.
***
Manmohan and Sonia long on rhetoric, short on delivery
Their assurances on good governance and fighting corruption doesn’t match by facts on ground
May 23 2011
Presenting his government’s report card on completion of two years of its second term on Sunday the prime minister said, referring to the spate of scams, that his government was “determined to take corrective action”.
UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to echoed the sentiment by adding that “transparency, accountability and probity are at the very heart of our governance, our actions and we demonstrate this”.
These are reassuring words, except that there is little substance in what is being said.
If both the prime minister and the UPA chairperson were referring to actions against A Raja, Suresh Kalmadi, Hassan Ali, Kanimozhi and others, it may be pointed out that in each of these cases it was the supreme court which pressed for action, not the government.
For example, Raja was removed from office only after the supreme court demanded to know why he was continuing in office long after the 2G spectrum scam had blown in the face of the government. Similarly, in the case of the Hassan Ali, accused of stashing money in tax havens abroad and a tax defaulter, the government acted after the apex court asked “what the hell is going on in this country”.
Had the government been sincere, it would have acted much earlier when the scams came to notice. Raja was reappointed telecom minister in 2009 and Kalmadi continued to be CWG organising committee chairman long after their wrongdoings had come to light.
Investigations into the 2G spectrum scam have also thrown up names of some top corporate honchos and other personalities, who are yet to be proceeded against.
Even on the Lokpal bill, which envisages setting up an anti-corruption watchdog, the government showed little interest until Anna Hazare forced its hand by sitting on a fast unto death. The government’s lack of sincerity in battling corruption was exposed in the way P J Thomas, a bureaucrat against whom a criminal charge sheet was pending for 20 years, was appointed the central vigilance commissioner in spite of the protest from the leader of opposition, Sushma Swaraj, who was a member of the selection panel. The government continued to defend Thomas’ appointment even in the supreme court when a PIL was filed. It was the court which sent Thomas packing.
There is little on the ground to suggest that the government has done anything to improve governance or check corruption. Or bring back the black money stashed abroad.
***
Making a hash of its mandate
IIT-Roorkee's study is counterproductive
June 27 2011
The first ever cumulative impact assessment (CIA) study of hydro-power projects being built on Bhagirathi and Alaknanda, two tributaries of river Ganga, has come as a big disappointment.
Carried out by the Alternate Hydro Energy Centre (AHEC) of IIT (Roorkee), which submitted its report to the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) recently, the study ignores the very raison d’être of its endeavour – assess cumulative impact of 70 hydro-power projects (HPs) commissioned or in various stages of development (three of which were scrapped last year) on these rivers, their surrounding ecosystems and human habitations along the rivers. Of the 70, 54 are run-of-the-river (ROR) and the rest storage-based projects.
The task was onerous and yet important to make sure the drive to harness hydro-power doesn’t kill the rivers and the life-sustaining environment they build around them. In fact, it was prompted by a supreme court order of 2009 to allay such fears and came in the wake of scrapping three major HPs – at Loharinag Pala, Pala Maneri and Bhaironghati on Bhagirathi river. But the findings not only fail to live up to the expectations, they do a reverse swing and advocate more such projects.
Here are some of the key issues involved in the study, the findings and what’s wrong with these findings.
* Both Bhagirathi and Alaknand originate from glaciers and so do several of their tributaries. The report says glaciers are in much higher altitudes, upstream and distant to be affected by the HPs.
Right, but it doesn’t take into consideration the crucial fact that 75 percent of Himalayan glaciers are retreating at an annual rate of 3.75 percent. This was revealed in the “most detailed” satellite-imagery based study “Snow and glaciers of the Himalayas” carried out jointly by the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) and Department of Space. Though this particular report was released in June this year, similar findings have been published in the past too.
The study doesn't take into consideration how much less water will flow in over the next five, 10 or 15 years and how that would impact the existing hydro-power projects. Prudence demands that such information are taken into consideration while planning or assessing projects.
*A dam (storage-based project) submerges part of the river and run-of-the-river project diverts a part of it, thus “affecting” the river. Talking about diversion, the report says “the river becomes dry in the diverted stretch” which could be “very long” and “fatal to aquatic life”, besides depriving water to people on the banks. Submergence too has an adverse impact.
The report goes on to point out that the existing HPs would affect 47.3 percent of Bhagirathi and its tributaries and 43.9 percent of Alaknand and its tributaries. While failing to assess what the cumulative impact would be on the rivers and their tributaries, the report proposes "a threshold, say 70 percent, may be fixed" for this, meaning that a river may be allowed to be submerged or diverted up to 70 percent of its length.
Shockingly, the study doesn’t say on what basis this threshold has been arrived at. Taken singly, the report points out, 70.71 percent of Bhagirathi river is affected (31% diverted, 39% submerged), yet it goes on to advocate for revival of the Loharinag Pala project and others on the same river which were scrapped last year.
* The study recognizes the fact that all HPs adversely impact the river and its aquatic life and hence it should get a breathing space between the dams/barrages “so that the river is given an opportunity to recuperate its ecological environment”. But what should this breathing space be or whether adequate breathing space has been provided in the existing projects has not been spelt out.
* The study recognizes that HPs restrict flow of rivers and that to keep the rivers and their ecosystems in good health and sustain human livelihood and wellbeing certain quantity of water should “always flow in the rivers”. It describes this flow as “environmental flow” but bases its calculations on the “minimum flow” required, ignoring needs and expectations of people living on the banks, a flow required to help flora and fauna to prosper and flourish, and not just survive and the fact that floods too have important ecological functions.
While proposing a minimum flow, the report acknowledges that this may reduce power generation and “such reduction may make several schemes unviable, especially small scale hydropower schemes”. Yet, it doesn’t say if we should scrap more projects to account to prevent this. On the contrary it concludes that hydro-power can be harnessed with environmental sustainability “provided certain measures are taken”. What these measures are, we are not told.
This part of the study also suffers from “a major handicap” as “measured river cross sections and velocity of flows were available at limited locations”. It goes on to say that the desired “building block method” which should be applied to arrive at the right environmental flow “requires much more data, time and manpower and other resources and therefore, could not be applied in this study”.
* The study registers negative changes in water quality but gives a thumbs-up saying that the impact is well within the limits of environmental sustainability. This assessment is based on individual case studies, rather than the combined impact of a series of projects. Experts point out that the thumbs-up is based on Centre for Pollution Control Board’s “use-based” classification of water which may be okay to determine potability of water drawn from a tube well but not for determining water quality of a natural river.
* The study admits that Bhagirathi and Alaknanda river basins are rich in biodiversity “designated as sensitive habitats” with “high conservation significance”. It also says that construction of reservoirs prevents migration of aquatic life and changes the domain of flowing water (river) to a standing water (lake) domain. This change brings about “significant changes in physic-chemical characteristics affecting the ecological parameters.
But it goes on to conclude: “So far, we don’t have any study of changes in aquatic life from river to reservoir. Thus, at present it is not possible to give any firm assessment on the impact of HPs on biodiversity of Alaknand and Bhagirathi.” But wasn’t that the purpose of the study?
It devotes considerable space to impact on fishes, particularly the famed golden mahseer and snow trout that so characterize these rivers by observing that the fishes “require an uninterrupted riverine habitat as well as floodplains for their breeding”, which dams and tunnels disrupt. And by way of solution, it says “fish passes” of various kinds be used. But not a word has been said about the efficacy of these passes and instances where such methods have been used successfully to make a convincing argument.
The only worthwhile suggestion the report contains is that no more HPs should be set up on the tributaries of Bhagirathi and Alaknand. It sys: “These streams have been identified as Nayar, Birhi Ganga, Bhyunder Ganga, Balganga and Asiganga which should not be exploited further as these are the lifelines of the main ecosystem of Alaknanda and Bhagirathi rivers”.
* The study points out that tunneling work for ROR projects damage springs and other underground water channels. This alters water availability and effects local population. But in a typical bureaucratic exercise, it says such blockages would lead to springs finding alternate routes and that the reservoirs being built in other projects would recharge ground water to conclude that the effect will be localized and the cumulative impact will be negligible. And then it goes on to contradict itself: “In the absence of relevant groundwater in the project scenario it may be difficult (or improper) to conclude with confidence on the impact on construction of HPs on the availability of drinking water sources to the population in the project area”.
* Photographs carried in the report tell a harrowing tale of recklessness. Huge piles of muck, generated from excavation work, have been dumped in the river beds, skirting the water flow and in forested areas of hills destroying vegetation. Instead of expressing anxiety and asking for immediate remedial action to prevent damage to the river and forests, it merely advises that suitable dumping ground may be found.
Worse, it points out that afforestation and catchment area treatment has not started for any of the HPs and that post construction impact data are not available. Yet, it concludes that “the problems generated during the construction “will die out automatically”.
* The study is dotted with lamentations about lack of data and relevant information. The chapter on “recommendations” begins with this gem: “In view of the fact that the field of cumulative impact assessment (CIA) is new and is being introduced for the first time in India, there are many gaps in the knowledge necessary to undertake CIA with the desired degree of precision, particularly in the Himalayan region where the database is weaker than that in the rest of the country. It is therefore necessary that a major programme of research and development should be drawn and implemented as early as possible.”
Bharat Jhunjhunwala, former professor of IIM-Bangalore whose petition to the central empowered committee (CEC) led to the supreme court ordering this cumulative study in 2009, says the basic mistake of the study is to define cumulative impact more in terms of sustainable development in long term and less in terms of combined impact of more than one project taken together.
He goes on to add that AHEC has failed to include several impacts in its study: loss of forests and biodiversity, trapping of sediments in reservoirs, methane emissions from reservoir, impact on health due to mosquito breeding in reservoirs and so on.
In fact, when IIT-Roorkee was given the task by the MoEF, he had objected to the choice of both the organization and its director Arun Kumar, saying that their primary competence was in engineering and design of small hydropower projects, rather than environmental studies. He would have preferred if the task had been given to NEERI, Wildlife Institution of India or Forest Research Institute.
Himanshu Thakkar, an expert on water management issues, dismisses the report as “pathetic” and says he is planning to write to the environment minister Jairam Ramesh to junk it.
He finds several major flaws: lamentations about lack of relevant data which was its job to provide, a pronounced bias for hydropower projects, absence of cumulative impact study of key indicators, silence on restrictions to ensure bio-diversity and ecological stability and several others. He is particularly disturbed with the IIT-Roorkee’s prescription of letting 70 percent of the river length be affected. He says a river gets killed in two ways – submergence and diversion – adding, “So to allow killing of 70 percent of a river is nonsense”.
Democracy minus people: and other write ups
True face of governance in Orissa
June 15 2011
Can there be anything more telling about the insensitivity and brutality of a democratically elected government which sends cops to surround villages where young children and women are lying on the ground for days together to resist forcible eviction from their land by declaring their protest “unlawful”?
Photographs of people’s protest from Jagatsinghpur in Orissa, who are resisting acquisition of their land for South Korean steel major Posco, are shocking to say the least. But that has not moved anyone.
The high-handedness of the state is evident. It wants to acquire the land no matter what. Its MoU with Posco lapsed a year ago and hence acquiring land on its behalf is wholly illegal. A PIL challenging this was filed in the high court a fortnight ago, but the court has found no time to take it up. In contrast, Allahabad high court took suo motu cognizance of newspaper reports recently to quash land acquisition by the UP government in several places.
No political party of any worth in the state, save for marginal players like the CPI and CPM, has come forward to speak for the people. The ruling BJD and other players like BJP and Congress have been know-towing with Posco for the past six years. The bureaucracy too is completely on the side of the private company. Nobody stands up for the rule of law knowing well that the action violates the Forest Rights Act and sidesteps gram panchayats’ resolutions opposing the move.
Last Sunday, three days into the desperate attempt by two thousand villagers to protect their homes and land by lying down on the ground, the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF), which granted forest clearance a month ago to make way for land acquisition, makes a ridiculous statement.
It says the state government can’t “use this clearance as a license for forcible acquisition of land”. What then the clearance was for?
The cops have been standing guard, surrounding the villages of Dhinkia pancyat for days now, waiting for the villagers to blink. Yesterday, the state government put off forcible eviction for five days in view of “raja” festival.
But how long the villagers can stand up to the state’s might is a moot question. For now, children and women are lying on the ground with men providing them food and water. The centre has provided a good example of using tear gas and police batons to forcibly throw away Baba Ramdev and his followers from the Ramlila grounds though they were holding a peaceful demonstration against corruption. They were sleeping at the time of police action.
How will the centre then stop Orissa if it were to use force in a similar fashion?
***
Why grudge 'political' protests
Handle all such protests politically
June 06 2011
Under fire from all quarters, the government's chief negotiator and HRD minister Kapil Sibal justified police action against Baba Ramdev and his followers a day after on the plea that the man in saffron had 'politicised' the issues and turned his yoga shivir into a 'political stage'.
The Congress party, which leads the coalition government, also came to the same conclusion after UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi had a brainstorming session with her 'core group' and declared that a counteroffensive would be launched against the 'political and communal forces'.
The implication is clear. Both the Congress and the government it leads see 'politicisation' of the Baba’s fight against corruption and black money as a necessary evil that has to be crushed.
But what, pray, is 'political' if the fight against corruption and black money is not? Even a layman understands that politics is something that has anything to do with running the affairs of a state and this would make the movement of Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare eminently 'political'.
Or do the Congress and its government at the centre think that politics is the sole prerogative of the political parties that contest elections and therefore of their members who 'represent' people in our representative democratic set-up? If that be the case, why doesn't a democratically elected leader dare to lead a movement against corruption and collect a huge crowd at the Ramlila Maidan instead?
Truth be told, no politician, notwithstanding the number of elections he or she may have won, today commands the kind of credibility and following that Baba Ramdev, and Anna Hazare before him, has demonstrated, at least on the issue of corruption and black money.
The rise of Ramdev and Anna is symptomatic of a political vacuum. By undermining them both the ruling coalition is only creating more trouble for itself. It only shows that the government is insincere or worse. The crowd at the Ramlila grounds was holding a peaceful demonstration against the government’s failures and there was, therefore, little justification in using brute force of the state.
Some of the political commentators acting as self-appointed advisors of the government of the day also seem to have little understanding of democracy and politics. They think democracy for people means casting of their votes and that politics is all about what the elected representatives do.
One eminent commentator has asked Ramdev and Anna to “first prove their popularity at any election”. If election is the criteria, prime minister Manmohan Singh has no business being what he is. The only election he ever contested happened in the late 1990s and he lost. Even after being a prime minister for the second time in a row he can’t dare contest again.
So far as “poor Digvijay Singh, fighting a lonely battle in a lost cause, a forlorn, modern-day Jhansi ki Rani”, is concerned, he lost Madhya Pradesh after two consecutive terms as chief minister to a simple promise of the BJP: "bijli, sadak aur pani". If in his ten years of running the government in Madhya Pradesh he couldn’t provide the basic needs like bijli, sadak and pani to his people, what kind of battle is he capable of fighting?
Besides, this commentator has poor sense of both history and contemporary politics. The Jhansi ki Rani fought against the British colonial rule. Here, Digvijay Singh is fighting against two citizens, Anna and Ramdev, who are fighting corruption. That would make Digvijay’s fight a fight to perpetuate corruption and black money, hardly something the Jhansi ki Rani would have felt proud of.
As Anna rightly said the other day, in a democracy people are the 'king' and those running a democratic government "servants of the people". That would make Anna, Ramdev, you and me the kings, not Diggy Raja or Kapil Sibal or Manmohan Singh.
But the darbaris are hardly expected to understand the grammar of democracy.
Decay of democracy
Book review, Governance Now, July 1-15, 2011
A gripping account of the slide of a liberal parliamentary democracy with lively and independent institutions towards a ‘failed state’
Last week, the prestigious Washington-based Foreign Policy magazine released its annual index of the most ‘failed states’ which featured several of our neighbours – Pakistan (at number 12), Bangladesh (at 25), Nepal (at 27) and Sri Lanka (at 29) – in the list of 60 which is topped by the African nations. For many, Sri Lanka seemed an unlikely member.
This is what the magazine said to justify Sri Lanka’s inclusion: “This May, Sri Lanka celebrated its second year of peace after 26 years of civil war with a separatist army in the north and east, the so-called Tamil Tigers. It was a conflict marked by brutality from start to end. The Tigers fought the central government with assassinations and terrorist attacks. The government’s final push against the rebels relied on the shelling of civilians and other atrocities, according to a 2010 report by the International Crisis Group. The most recent statistics from last year indicate that some 327,000 are still displaced from the conflict.”
In his book, “The Cage: The Fight for Sri Lanka and the Last Days of the Tamil Tigers”, Gordon Weiss, a journalist-turned-UN spokesman in Sri Lanka who witnessed it first hand, captures the finale of that bloody civil war in great detail. Apart from the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil rebels, even the international community, including the UN, emerges with a taint difficult to ignore in a hurry; the last one because of its failure to prevent or reduce civilian killings and take appropriate remedial action, thanks largely to China’s interventions on behalf of Sri Lanka.
But the book’s canvass is much bigger and helps explaining Sri Lanka’s listing as a failed state. Weiss traces the island nation’s history, particularly of the recent decades, to find a series of state-sponsored pogroms despite being dominated by followers of peace-loving Buddhist philosophy. Beginning with the massacre of “tens of thousands” of young Marxist Sinhalese who revolted against the state in 1971 and the late 1980s to the killing of between 1,000 to 3,000 Tamil youths in riots of 1983’s Black July, the unbridled power of the state, near permanent “state of emergency” laws, degradation of police and judicial institutions, ethnic cleansing and a subjugated media set the stage for the horrifying tale of 2009 anti-LTTE operation which again claimed “tens of thousands” of civilians trapped in a corner of country’s northeast coast (‘the cage’ of the book) with the Tamil rebels. That is a big come down for a country which was born a liberal democratic state in 1948, minus birth pangs of India and with the potential to become economic powerhouse in Asia.
Post conquest of the Tigers, the economy of Sri Lanka has recovered and is, in fact, booming; but Weiss has other worries. He sees a ‘decay’ in Sri Lanka’s democratic values (a phenomenon he describes as “democratic recession”) and emergence of a ‘Sri Lankan model’ which he describes thus: “A society sliding into tyranny where myth-making, identity whitewashing and political opportunism have defeated justice and individual dignity.”
A good pick for those keen to find out why democracy is finding it difficult to flourish in our part of the world. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
A gripping account of the slide of a liberal parliamentary democracy with lively and independent institutions towards a ‘failed state’
Last week, the prestigious Washington-based Foreign Policy magazine released its annual index of the most ‘failed states’ which featured several of our neighbours – Pakistan (at number 12), Bangladesh (at 25), Nepal (at 27) and Sri Lanka (at 29) – in the list of 60 which is topped by the African nations. For many, Sri Lanka seemed an unlikely member.
This is what the magazine said to justify Sri Lanka’s inclusion: “This May, Sri Lanka celebrated its second year of peace after 26 years of civil war with a separatist army in the north and east, the so-called Tamil Tigers. It was a conflict marked by brutality from start to end. The Tigers fought the central government with assassinations and terrorist attacks. The government’s final push against the rebels relied on the shelling of civilians and other atrocities, according to a 2010 report by the International Crisis Group. The most recent statistics from last year indicate that some 327,000 are still displaced from the conflict.”
In his book, “The Cage: The Fight for Sri Lanka and the Last Days of the Tamil Tigers”, Gordon Weiss, a journalist-turned-UN spokesman in Sri Lanka who witnessed it first hand, captures the finale of that bloody civil war in great detail. Apart from the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil rebels, even the international community, including the UN, emerges with a taint difficult to ignore in a hurry; the last one because of its failure to prevent or reduce civilian killings and take appropriate remedial action, thanks largely to China’s interventions on behalf of Sri Lanka.
But the book’s canvass is much bigger and helps explaining Sri Lanka’s listing as a failed state. Weiss traces the island nation’s history, particularly of the recent decades, to find a series of state-sponsored pogroms despite being dominated by followers of peace-loving Buddhist philosophy. Beginning with the massacre of “tens of thousands” of young Marxist Sinhalese who revolted against the state in 1971 and the late 1980s to the killing of between 1,000 to 3,000 Tamil youths in riots of 1983’s Black July, the unbridled power of the state, near permanent “state of emergency” laws, degradation of police and judicial institutions, ethnic cleansing and a subjugated media set the stage for the horrifying tale of 2009 anti-LTTE operation which again claimed “tens of thousands” of civilians trapped in a corner of country’s northeast coast (‘the cage’ of the book) with the Tamil rebels. That is a big come down for a country which was born a liberal democratic state in 1948, minus birth pangs of India and with the potential to become economic powerhouse in Asia.
Post conquest of the Tigers, the economy of Sri Lanka has recovered and is, in fact, booming; but Weiss has other worries. He sees a ‘decay’ in Sri Lanka’s democratic values (a phenomenon he describes as “democratic recession”) and emergence of a ‘Sri Lankan model’ which he describes thus: “A society sliding into tyranny where myth-making, identity whitewashing and political opportunism have defeated justice and individual dignity.”
A good pick for those keen to find out why democracy is finding it difficult to flourish in our part of the world. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
Nothing ‘inclusive’ about this project
Governance Now, July 1-15, 2011
Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh provides a valuable lesson on how letting a private company to acquire land for development projects can actually do more harm than good
Following the brouhaha over land acquisition in Bhatta-Parsaul in Greater Noida, the government has renewed its promise to bring in two legislations – one to amend the Land Acquisition Act of 1894 and the other to provide resettlement and rehabilitation rights to those who lose their land and livelihood to such acquisitions.
The basic purpose of the exercise is to address two fundamental flaws in the antiquated Land Acquistition Act. While this law gives unlimited power to the government to acquire land, it provides nothing beyond cash compensation in return. Given the imperial context in which it was framed, it is hardly surprising that this law is silent on rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) of those who survive on the land and hence, would be rendered destitute without it.
But the new formulation, in the form of the Land Acquisition (Amendment) Bill, readied in 2007 but held back because of Mamata Banerjee’s opposition, will not improve the situation. If at all, it will worsen it. Instead of following the existing policy of ‘land in lieu of land’, the draft bill allows a private company to buy up to 70 percent of land needed for a development project and the rest, 30 percent, will then be acquired by the goverernment on its behalf. And the proposed R&R legislation will be applicable to those displaced from this 30 percent land. (The National Advisory Council has, in the meanwhile, suggested continuation of the existing law that allows the government acquiring all the required land.)
The Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh is a fine example of how letting a private company buy 70 percent land can play havoc with the lives of the small and marginal farmers, tribals and other weaker sections of society who are sought to be protected by the proposed legislations.
Some basic facts first. The Maheshwar hydroelectric project is a run-of-the-river scheme conceived and finalised by the Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA) of the Madhya Pradesh government in 1988 and is one of the 30 major dams being built on the Narmada. It was handed over to the Madhya Pradesh Electricity Board in 1991 and two years later, to a private company, S Kumar-promoted Shri Maheshwar Hydel Power Corporation Limited (SMHPCL). It was the first hydel project in the country to be thus given to a private company under the policy of promoting private sector participation in generating power.
The project involves building a 36m high concrete dam on the Narmada in Khargaon district to generate 400 mw of power. When complete, it will submerge 5,700 hectare of land, of which 4,900 hectare belongs to the government and the rest, 873 hectare to the farmers, tribals and others living in 61 villages – 13 of which will submerge fully, nine partially and 39 will lose only agricultural land.
In 1999, land acquisition notice was issued to acquire Jalud village, which is closest to the dam site. But it was only to acquire the ‘abadi’ (homestead land) of the village, not its agricultural land which too will submerge. The Damocles’ sword was thus hung over their heads.
Interestingly, such notices were not issued for the rest of the villages.
No land for land
Another interesting development took place simultaneously. The private company (SMHPCL), which is to bear the resettlement and rehabilitation cost of the people to be displaced, was allowed to buy agricultural land to be submerged.
SMHPCL got into work with right ernest and ended up buying 583 hectares of the total 873 hectares of land belonging to more than 1,000 families – that is, 66.78 percent of agricultural land needed to be acquired – until it was stopped by the Madhya Pradesh high court in 2009.
The high court, staying the private purchase of land, said in its order of May 6, 2009: “In our considered opinion, therefore, allowing the purchase of land of the oustees by private sale-deeds by the respondent no 2 (SMHPCL) would not only be contrary to the R&R Policy as amended up to 2005 but may also be result in exploitation of the oustees by the respondent no 2 (SMHPCL) by denying them their R&R entitlements and this may amount to violation of their fundamental rights under Article 21 of the Constitution.”
The court not only objected to private buying of land, saying that there was no such provision in the state government’s R&R policy, it also objected to the clause in the sale-deeds prepared and registered by SMHPCL which said the oustee selling land will not be entitled to the government’s R&R policy, including the benefit of ‘land in lieu of land’. The R&R policy provides for land for land – a minimum of two and a maximum of eight hectares.
I C Jain, SMHPCL’s senior general manager looking after R&R work at the site, says the company decided to pay cash for land because the state government said no agricultural land was available for the oustees. He also says that the landholders were paid higher than the prevailing market rate (up to 25 percent).
Jain justifies paying cash for land by pointing out that the R&R policy of the government did not make it binding to provide ‘land in lieu of land’ as it qualified this by saying that land would be given “as far as possible”.
Simply put, SMHPCL used the leeway granted by the phrase “as far as possible” to deny land to all. (The phrase “as far as possible” was added in the R&R policy in 2003. Until then, ‘land in lieu of land’ was mandatory, as in the case of the Sardar Sarovar project on the Narmada.)
It may be pointed out that the supreme court recently dismissed such a plea of the Madhya Pradesh government to deny land to the oustees of the Omkareshwar project, another run-of-the-river project on the Narmada. The apex court said: “The submission raised on behalf of the state that it had been impossible for authorities to acquire/purchase the land cannot be accepted as this is a pure question of fact and in absence of any material to show that any attempt had ever been made to acquire the land to rehabilitate the oustees, such a submission remains unsubstantiated.”
It went on to add: “The phrase ‘as far as possible’ would come into play in case an attempt is made to acquire/purchase land and then to make allotment of land to oustees.” But not when the state made no such effort.
The court explained why land must be given in lieu of land. It said “assured possession (of land) is a lasting source for peace and prosperity” and that the right of the farmer to cultivation is a “part of right to livelihood” and thus, “deprivation of right to livelihood under Article 21 is unsustainable”. About the tribals, it said: “In the process of development, the state cannot be permitted to displace tribal people, a vulnerable section of our society, suffering from poverty and ignorance, without taking apporporiate remedial measures of rehabilitation.”
The apex court directed that even in the case of shortage of land, two hectares of land “must” be given to the oustees belonging to the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and marginal farmers.
In the case of Maheshwar project, the victims of private sale-deeds are mostly marginal farmers and tribals (24 villages in Maheshwar tehsil come under notified tribal area), who stare at an uncertain future once their home and land is submerged. A tour of the project-affected area throws up several such cases.
Ram Chandra Rathod, 40-year-old resident of Pathrakhurd village, owned half an acre of agricultural land, which he sold off in 1999 for Rs 76,000. He repaid his debts and got his younger brother married with the money. Now, he has to survive by working at others’ farmland as a labourer. Had the R&R policy been implemented he would have got two hectares of agriculture land. Now he says he doesn’t know what fate has in store for him.
Jairam Karma of the same village sold off his entire six acre of land coming under submergence, at the rate of Rs 1.3 lakh an acre, and distributed the money among his four brothers and a sister. He kept his share in the bank as he couldn’t get suitable land to buy and now works as a farm labour. Others like Chhatar Singh of Sulgaon village are wiser. He sold off his two-acre land and bought three acres of farm land with the money at a place 25 km away where his uncle lives.
Shockingly, while admitting the scope for exploitation and violation of their fundamental rights, the Madhya Pradesh high court, which stopped SMHPCL’s buying spree, didn’t reverse the process. Or asked the government and the SMHPCL to give land in lieu of land to those families who sold off their land. It merely asked the government to acquire the rest of the land, 290 hectares, in accordance with the Land Acquisition Act of 1894.
Thereafter, acquisition notices were sent to the rest of the oustees. Meanwhile, acquisition notices for ‘abadi’ (homestead land) were also issued.
The state government has been equally callous in its attitude. There is sufficient evidence to show that no attempt was made to acquire and distribute land to the oustees. N K Trivedi, superintendent engineer of Madhya Pradesh State Electricity Board, who is the point-man of the government overseeing R&R work of the project, agrees that no land was available for allotment in lieu of land but, in the same breath, adds that nobody came to demand it. “They may have done so collectively, no individual came to us. They have to make demands to us (for land) individually,” he says when it is pointed out that about 500 farmers have petititioned for land.
Poor R&R
Work on the project is complete to the extent of 98.4 percent at present, according to SMHPCL. The dam has been built, only five spillway gates needs to be installed, for which permission was granted by environment minister Jairam Ramesh on May 6. He had stopped all work on the dam in April 2010 precisely because of poor R&R.
As per the condition of the environmental clearance, R&R should proceed “pari passu” with construction. Therefore, R&R work should have been completed to that extent by now. The company claims to have completed 70 percent of work. Ramesh dismissed this in his May 6 order saying it was “not at all convincing”.
A visit to the area shows SMHPCL’s claims are highly exaggerated. Even the basic work like survey to identify houses and land of the oustees is in progress. Even in Jalud village, acquired in 1999, scores of villagers are desperate that they have been left out in the survey. Chirakhan village in Maheshwar tehsil (with about 100 households) was surveyed only last March and were officially told what they have been dreading for more than 10 years – their village will submerge completely.
The backwater survey, on the basis of which properties in 11 villages are to be acquired, has just been completed but not made public. Acquisition process has, thus, not even started.
Most of the villages received notices for acquisition of their ‘abadi’ (homestead) land in the last two years. The notified tribal villages are strongly protesting against the move. As a result, most villagers are yet to get the compensation.
The resettlement and rehabilitation of the oustees is equally tardy. Of 18 rehabilitation sites to be developed, land has not been acquired for four. Only 559 of the 8,903 project-affected families (PAFs) have shifted to the rehabilitation sites. Thus, it will take years before the oustees are actually resettled.
As for providing them a source of livelihood, there is little on offer, except the monetary support the R&R policy provides for (see box). When asked about it, Trivedi said 150 youths were given training at ITI in Punasa and sewing centres were run in a handful of villages (he counted three) which are now closed. He had no idea how many actually benefitted.
So much for promoting the private sector for ‘inclusive’ growth. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
***
Boxes
Rehab status
* Families shifted to rehab sites (of a total of 8,903 PAFs): 559 (Jalud: All 299, Pitamli: 92 of 167 allotted, Lepa: 163 of 482 allotted and Raver: 5 of 24)
* Number of housing plots required for shifting oustees: 7,678
* Number of housing plots available so far: 3,267
* Number of plots allotted: 1,978
* Rehabilitation sites for four villages (of 18 required) not yet acquired
* 290 hectare of people’s land yet to be acquired
* Most of the oustees are yet to get paid for house and other assets they will be losing
***
What oustees are getting
1. Compensation for houses ranges from Rs 35,000 to Rs 17 lakh
2. No land for land. Land prices given: Up to 25 percent higher than market price, claims SMHPCL
3. Rehab grants to an oustee (as per R&R policy):
Landless labourer : Rs 18,700
Landowning SC/ST: Rs 18,700
Small/marginal farmer: Rs 18,700
Others: Rs 9,350
Transport allowance: Rs 5,000
4. Cash compensation in case housing plot is surrendered: Rs 75,000 (including Rs 25,000 special grant by SMHPCL)
5. Livelihood grant to purchase productive assets to
SC/ST families : Rs 49,300
Landless : Rs 33,150
Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh provides a valuable lesson on how letting a private company to acquire land for development projects can actually do more harm than good
Following the brouhaha over land acquisition in Bhatta-Parsaul in Greater Noida, the government has renewed its promise to bring in two legislations – one to amend the Land Acquisition Act of 1894 and the other to provide resettlement and rehabilitation rights to those who lose their land and livelihood to such acquisitions.
The basic purpose of the exercise is to address two fundamental flaws in the antiquated Land Acquistition Act. While this law gives unlimited power to the government to acquire land, it provides nothing beyond cash compensation in return. Given the imperial context in which it was framed, it is hardly surprising that this law is silent on rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) of those who survive on the land and hence, would be rendered destitute without it.
But the new formulation, in the form of the Land Acquisition (Amendment) Bill, readied in 2007 but held back because of Mamata Banerjee’s opposition, will not improve the situation. If at all, it will worsen it. Instead of following the existing policy of ‘land in lieu of land’, the draft bill allows a private company to buy up to 70 percent of land needed for a development project and the rest, 30 percent, will then be acquired by the goverernment on its behalf. And the proposed R&R legislation will be applicable to those displaced from this 30 percent land. (The National Advisory Council has, in the meanwhile, suggested continuation of the existing law that allows the government acquiring all the required land.)
The Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh is a fine example of how letting a private company buy 70 percent land can play havoc with the lives of the small and marginal farmers, tribals and other weaker sections of society who are sought to be protected by the proposed legislations.
Some basic facts first. The Maheshwar hydroelectric project is a run-of-the-river scheme conceived and finalised by the Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA) of the Madhya Pradesh government in 1988 and is one of the 30 major dams being built on the Narmada. It was handed over to the Madhya Pradesh Electricity Board in 1991 and two years later, to a private company, S Kumar-promoted Shri Maheshwar Hydel Power Corporation Limited (SMHPCL). It was the first hydel project in the country to be thus given to a private company under the policy of promoting private sector participation in generating power.
The project involves building a 36m high concrete dam on the Narmada in Khargaon district to generate 400 mw of power. When complete, it will submerge 5,700 hectare of land, of which 4,900 hectare belongs to the government and the rest, 873 hectare to the farmers, tribals and others living in 61 villages – 13 of which will submerge fully, nine partially and 39 will lose only agricultural land.
In 1999, land acquisition notice was issued to acquire Jalud village, which is closest to the dam site. But it was only to acquire the ‘abadi’ (homestead land) of the village, not its agricultural land which too will submerge. The Damocles’ sword was thus hung over their heads.
Interestingly, such notices were not issued for the rest of the villages.
No land for land
Another interesting development took place simultaneously. The private company (SMHPCL), which is to bear the resettlement and rehabilitation cost of the people to be displaced, was allowed to buy agricultural land to be submerged.
SMHPCL got into work with right ernest and ended up buying 583 hectares of the total 873 hectares of land belonging to more than 1,000 families – that is, 66.78 percent of agricultural land needed to be acquired – until it was stopped by the Madhya Pradesh high court in 2009.
The high court, staying the private purchase of land, said in its order of May 6, 2009: “In our considered opinion, therefore, allowing the purchase of land of the oustees by private sale-deeds by the respondent no 2 (SMHPCL) would not only be contrary to the R&R Policy as amended up to 2005 but may also be result in exploitation of the oustees by the respondent no 2 (SMHPCL) by denying them their R&R entitlements and this may amount to violation of their fundamental rights under Article 21 of the Constitution.”
The court not only objected to private buying of land, saying that there was no such provision in the state government’s R&R policy, it also objected to the clause in the sale-deeds prepared and registered by SMHPCL which said the oustee selling land will not be entitled to the government’s R&R policy, including the benefit of ‘land in lieu of land’. The R&R policy provides for land for land – a minimum of two and a maximum of eight hectares.
I C Jain, SMHPCL’s senior general manager looking after R&R work at the site, says the company decided to pay cash for land because the state government said no agricultural land was available for the oustees. He also says that the landholders were paid higher than the prevailing market rate (up to 25 percent).
Jain justifies paying cash for land by pointing out that the R&R policy of the government did not make it binding to provide ‘land in lieu of land’ as it qualified this by saying that land would be given “as far as possible”.
Simply put, SMHPCL used the leeway granted by the phrase “as far as possible” to deny land to all. (The phrase “as far as possible” was added in the R&R policy in 2003. Until then, ‘land in lieu of land’ was mandatory, as in the case of the Sardar Sarovar project on the Narmada.)
It may be pointed out that the supreme court recently dismissed such a plea of the Madhya Pradesh government to deny land to the oustees of the Omkareshwar project, another run-of-the-river project on the Narmada. The apex court said: “The submission raised on behalf of the state that it had been impossible for authorities to acquire/purchase the land cannot be accepted as this is a pure question of fact and in absence of any material to show that any attempt had ever been made to acquire the land to rehabilitate the oustees, such a submission remains unsubstantiated.”
It went on to add: “The phrase ‘as far as possible’ would come into play in case an attempt is made to acquire/purchase land and then to make allotment of land to oustees.” But not when the state made no such effort.
The court explained why land must be given in lieu of land. It said “assured possession (of land) is a lasting source for peace and prosperity” and that the right of the farmer to cultivation is a “part of right to livelihood” and thus, “deprivation of right to livelihood under Article 21 is unsustainable”. About the tribals, it said: “In the process of development, the state cannot be permitted to displace tribal people, a vulnerable section of our society, suffering from poverty and ignorance, without taking apporporiate remedial measures of rehabilitation.”
The apex court directed that even in the case of shortage of land, two hectares of land “must” be given to the oustees belonging to the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and marginal farmers.
In the case of Maheshwar project, the victims of private sale-deeds are mostly marginal farmers and tribals (24 villages in Maheshwar tehsil come under notified tribal area), who stare at an uncertain future once their home and land is submerged. A tour of the project-affected area throws up several such cases.
Ram Chandra Rathod, 40-year-old resident of Pathrakhurd village, owned half an acre of agricultural land, which he sold off in 1999 for Rs 76,000. He repaid his debts and got his younger brother married with the money. Now, he has to survive by working at others’ farmland as a labourer. Had the R&R policy been implemented he would have got two hectares of agriculture land. Now he says he doesn’t know what fate has in store for him.
Jairam Karma of the same village sold off his entire six acre of land coming under submergence, at the rate of Rs 1.3 lakh an acre, and distributed the money among his four brothers and a sister. He kept his share in the bank as he couldn’t get suitable land to buy and now works as a farm labour. Others like Chhatar Singh of Sulgaon village are wiser. He sold off his two-acre land and bought three acres of farm land with the money at a place 25 km away where his uncle lives.
Shockingly, while admitting the scope for exploitation and violation of their fundamental rights, the Madhya Pradesh high court, which stopped SMHPCL’s buying spree, didn’t reverse the process. Or asked the government and the SMHPCL to give land in lieu of land to those families who sold off their land. It merely asked the government to acquire the rest of the land, 290 hectares, in accordance with the Land Acquisition Act of 1894.
Thereafter, acquisition notices were sent to the rest of the oustees. Meanwhile, acquisition notices for ‘abadi’ (homestead land) were also issued.
The state government has been equally callous in its attitude. There is sufficient evidence to show that no attempt was made to acquire and distribute land to the oustees. N K Trivedi, superintendent engineer of Madhya Pradesh State Electricity Board, who is the point-man of the government overseeing R&R work of the project, agrees that no land was available for allotment in lieu of land but, in the same breath, adds that nobody came to demand it. “They may have done so collectively, no individual came to us. They have to make demands to us (for land) individually,” he says when it is pointed out that about 500 farmers have petititioned for land.
Poor R&R
Work on the project is complete to the extent of 98.4 percent at present, according to SMHPCL. The dam has been built, only five spillway gates needs to be installed, for which permission was granted by environment minister Jairam Ramesh on May 6. He had stopped all work on the dam in April 2010 precisely because of poor R&R.
As per the condition of the environmental clearance, R&R should proceed “pari passu” with construction. Therefore, R&R work should have been completed to that extent by now. The company claims to have completed 70 percent of work. Ramesh dismissed this in his May 6 order saying it was “not at all convincing”.
A visit to the area shows SMHPCL’s claims are highly exaggerated. Even the basic work like survey to identify houses and land of the oustees is in progress. Even in Jalud village, acquired in 1999, scores of villagers are desperate that they have been left out in the survey. Chirakhan village in Maheshwar tehsil (with about 100 households) was surveyed only last March and were officially told what they have been dreading for more than 10 years – their village will submerge completely.
The backwater survey, on the basis of which properties in 11 villages are to be acquired, has just been completed but not made public. Acquisition process has, thus, not even started.
Most of the villages received notices for acquisition of their ‘abadi’ (homestead) land in the last two years. The notified tribal villages are strongly protesting against the move. As a result, most villagers are yet to get the compensation.
The resettlement and rehabilitation of the oustees is equally tardy. Of 18 rehabilitation sites to be developed, land has not been acquired for four. Only 559 of the 8,903 project-affected families (PAFs) have shifted to the rehabilitation sites. Thus, it will take years before the oustees are actually resettled.
As for providing them a source of livelihood, there is little on offer, except the monetary support the R&R policy provides for (see box). When asked about it, Trivedi said 150 youths were given training at ITI in Punasa and sewing centres were run in a handful of villages (he counted three) which are now closed. He had no idea how many actually benefitted.
So much for promoting the private sector for ‘inclusive’ growth. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
***
Boxes
Rehab status
* Families shifted to rehab sites (of a total of 8,903 PAFs): 559 (Jalud: All 299, Pitamli: 92 of 167 allotted, Lepa: 163 of 482 allotted and Raver: 5 of 24)
* Number of housing plots required for shifting oustees: 7,678
* Number of housing plots available so far: 3,267
* Number of plots allotted: 1,978
* Rehabilitation sites for four villages (of 18 required) not yet acquired
* 290 hectare of people’s land yet to be acquired
* Most of the oustees are yet to get paid for house and other assets they will be losing
***
What oustees are getting
1. Compensation for houses ranges from Rs 35,000 to Rs 17 lakh
2. No land for land. Land prices given: Up to 25 percent higher than market price, claims SMHPCL
3. Rehab grants to an oustee (as per R&R policy):
Landless labourer : Rs 18,700
Landowning SC/ST: Rs 18,700
Small/marginal farmer: Rs 18,700
Others: Rs 9,350
Transport allowance: Rs 5,000
4. Cash compensation in case housing plot is surrendered: Rs 75,000 (including Rs 25,000 special grant by SMHPCL)
5. Livelihood grant to purchase productive assets to
SC/ST families : Rs 49,300
Landless : Rs 33,150
How far can UPA go with so much arrogance?
Edit, Governance Now, July 1-15, 2011
Conceit reflected in brushing aside corruption will prove government’s undoing
The fiasco over the Lokpal Bill, which was not entirely unexpected, is a symptom of a larger malaise that has gripped this government in recent times: arrogance of power. For a while it did seem that the public sentiment against corruption had a salutary effect on the government which opened a dialogue with both Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev. A joint drafting panel was set up and discussions began on a serious note. But soon the arrogance of the state gained an upper hand. Peaceful demonstrators sleeping at the Ramlila grounds were teargassed and forcibly evicted, and Baba Ramdev was dispatched to Haridwar. A lukewarm response that this brutality evoked from the public and the political opposition emboldened the government to a point where negotiations with Team Anna on the Lokpal Bill became meaningless. Differences kept growing and the last couple of meetings of the joint drafting panel looked more like a farce.
These are not the only indications. There is a series of indiscretions. While the negotiations with Team Anna were on, the government took a decision to take the Central Bureau of Investigation, our premier investigating agency fighting corruption, out of the RTI’s ambit. When the transparency law was being framed in 2005, the CBI had no reservations in being subjected to this law but now it has found an alibi: it is also involved in intelligence work and hence needs protection. Going by its poor track record in bringing to justice the corrupt holding high public offices and the tendency to play handmaiden to the political masters, the CBI’s exclusion from the RTI is scandalous. Weeks earlier, the union home ministry had rejected the Delhi Lokayukta’s recommendation to sack Delhi’s PWD minister Raj Kumar Chauhan for intervening in a tax evasion case involving a businessman, without explaining why. This was a shocking development given the fact that Chauhan had himself confessed to his wrongdoing.
Two more developments have taken place since then to demonstrate that the government doesn’t give a damn to what you and I think about corruption. Investigations into the 2G spectrum scam by the government’s own agency, the CBI, have uncovered textile minister Dayanidhi Maran’s corrupt deals while he was holding the telecom portfolio. But just as the government tried to brazen it out before the supreme court intervened and forced Maran’s successor in the telecom ministry, A Raja, out of the government and into Tihar jail, it remains impervious. The Comptroller and Auditor General’s leaked draft report has uncovered another dubious deal, this time involving another minister and his officials, which points out how Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) was shown undue favours at the cost of the national exchequer. Again, the government is not moved and wants time to enquire into it while CPI (M) MP Tapan Sen and retired bureaucrat EAS Sarma have pointed out that they had been alerting the PMO about the scam since December 2006. The PMO, however, didn’t seem to bother.
While a series of scams – 2G spectrum, Isro-Antrix deal, CWG, Adarsh, IPL, RIL and so on – happened during the UPA-I regime, there was one redeeming feature. That government had passed progressive laws and carried out welfare measures by way of the RTI, NREGA and Forest Rights Act at the National Advisory Council’s prompting. The UPA-II has no such claim so far. In fact, development economist Jean Dreze has quit from the NAC, saying, among other things, that the present NAC “doesn’t seem to have the ear of the government”. But that would seem a minor aberration compared to the complete disconnect with the people on whose behalf the UPA holds office, at least on the most pressing issue of the day: corruption. A day after negotiations with Team Anna broke down and Anna threatened to fast again, Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh issued a threat: If Anna goes on fast again, he will get the same treatment that Baba Ramdev received. Little do Singh and his friends realise that their arrogance will render them ‘unelected and unelectable’ come the next round of elections.
Conceit reflected in brushing aside corruption will prove government’s undoing
The fiasco over the Lokpal Bill, which was not entirely unexpected, is a symptom of a larger malaise that has gripped this government in recent times: arrogance of power. For a while it did seem that the public sentiment against corruption had a salutary effect on the government which opened a dialogue with both Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev. A joint drafting panel was set up and discussions began on a serious note. But soon the arrogance of the state gained an upper hand. Peaceful demonstrators sleeping at the Ramlila grounds were teargassed and forcibly evicted, and Baba Ramdev was dispatched to Haridwar. A lukewarm response that this brutality evoked from the public and the political opposition emboldened the government to a point where negotiations with Team Anna on the Lokpal Bill became meaningless. Differences kept growing and the last couple of meetings of the joint drafting panel looked more like a farce.
These are not the only indications. There is a series of indiscretions. While the negotiations with Team Anna were on, the government took a decision to take the Central Bureau of Investigation, our premier investigating agency fighting corruption, out of the RTI’s ambit. When the transparency law was being framed in 2005, the CBI had no reservations in being subjected to this law but now it has found an alibi: it is also involved in intelligence work and hence needs protection. Going by its poor track record in bringing to justice the corrupt holding high public offices and the tendency to play handmaiden to the political masters, the CBI’s exclusion from the RTI is scandalous. Weeks earlier, the union home ministry had rejected the Delhi Lokayukta’s recommendation to sack Delhi’s PWD minister Raj Kumar Chauhan for intervening in a tax evasion case involving a businessman, without explaining why. This was a shocking development given the fact that Chauhan had himself confessed to his wrongdoing.
Two more developments have taken place since then to demonstrate that the government doesn’t give a damn to what you and I think about corruption. Investigations into the 2G spectrum scam by the government’s own agency, the CBI, have uncovered textile minister Dayanidhi Maran’s corrupt deals while he was holding the telecom portfolio. But just as the government tried to brazen it out before the supreme court intervened and forced Maran’s successor in the telecom ministry, A Raja, out of the government and into Tihar jail, it remains impervious. The Comptroller and Auditor General’s leaked draft report has uncovered another dubious deal, this time involving another minister and his officials, which points out how Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) was shown undue favours at the cost of the national exchequer. Again, the government is not moved and wants time to enquire into it while CPI (M) MP Tapan Sen and retired bureaucrat EAS Sarma have pointed out that they had been alerting the PMO about the scam since December 2006. The PMO, however, didn’t seem to bother.
While a series of scams – 2G spectrum, Isro-Antrix deal, CWG, Adarsh, IPL, RIL and so on – happened during the UPA-I regime, there was one redeeming feature. That government had passed progressive laws and carried out welfare measures by way of the RTI, NREGA and Forest Rights Act at the National Advisory Council’s prompting. The UPA-II has no such claim so far. In fact, development economist Jean Dreze has quit from the NAC, saying, among other things, that the present NAC “doesn’t seem to have the ear of the government”. But that would seem a minor aberration compared to the complete disconnect with the people on whose behalf the UPA holds office, at least on the most pressing issue of the day: corruption. A day after negotiations with Team Anna broke down and Anna threatened to fast again, Congress general secretary Digvijaya Singh issued a threat: If Anna goes on fast again, he will get the same treatment that Baba Ramdev received. Little do Singh and his friends realise that their arrogance will render them ‘unelected and unelectable’ come the next round of elections.
There’s no right like ‘right to exemption’, Mr Sibal!
Edit, Governance Now, June 16-30, 2011
What we have, instead, is article 14 which guarantees 'right to equality' before the law
It came as a rude shock, yet it was to be expected. When the process of drafting the Lokpal bill got too serious, our “democratic representatives” balked. The government members of the joint drafting committee said the PM and the MPs (among many others) can’t be included in the Lokpal’s ambit because that will make the PM “dysfunctional” and violate “parliamentary privileges” of the MPs. The BJP said law-making was a parliamentary exercise and it would commit or comment only when the matter comes to the house. The Left dittoed.
The message is simple, and clear: our public representatives can’t be called to accountability. And that is how it has always been. They are the ones who make the law and they decided long ago that they are accountable to the parliament (that is, themselves) and to the people (once every five years, not in-between). Period.
Veteran political commentator Prem Shankar Jha says it is much more than just the culture of exemptions and privileges that our MPs (and MLAs) love so much. “It is a culture of ownership. We own India and all its resources. Therefore, we can take anything we want and are accountable to none, except ourselves. We are effectively above the law. We are the elite. The law is for the ruled. We are the rulers.”
Once elected, even if most of them get much less than half the votes polled, the normal law breaks down for our representatives. The traffic rules and toll taxes are not for them. They can’t be bothered with security checks or queues at airports and railway stations. Planes and trains wait for them. Key public buildings have separate entries and hospitals separate wards. They can’t move around without elaborate security cover. It doesn’t matter that 162 of our Lok Sabha members have criminal cases pending against them.
It also doesn’t matter that the average asset of our current Lok Sabha members is Rs 5.33 crore and that 315 of them are crorepatis. They get free accommodation in Lutyens’ sprawling bungalows, with free furniture and fittings, free electricity, water, phones, laptops and internet connections. They get low priced food in canteens and have a mini hospital to themselves at the parliament annexe. They get virtually endless free travel by plane and train, along with their companions, in additions to their spouses and sidekicks. Then they get a generous salary (Rs 50,000 a month) with a number of tax-free allowances running into a lakh or more of rupees every month, interest-free loans for cars and VIP discounts at state emporia and state cooperatives. And they also get to splurge Rs 5 crore a year by way of MPLADS funds.
Former Lok Sabha secretary general Subhash Kashyap wonders at the need to extend such privileges to those who least deserve it and yet are unwilling to any kind of scrutiny or accountability. We must do two things to change the Kafkaesque situation, he says: change the political culture and bring systemic reforms to ensure that those with criminal background and ill-gotten wealth are kept out. He is also against ‘nominated’ persons occupying exalted offices of the prime ministers and ministers.
Former cabinet secretary TSR Subramaniam rues that the constitution makers failed to foresee the kind of politicians who would follow them. Nehru and Ambedkar, he says, probably thought their inheritors would be like them and so didn’t prescribe a code of conduct or put elaborate checks and balances. The result is for all to see. While it is not too late to make amends, his advice to our representatives is succinct: Don’t forget, Article 14 of the constitution guarantees ‘equality before law’.
But does anyone really care? n
prasanna@governancenow.com
What we have, instead, is article 14 which guarantees 'right to equality' before the law
It came as a rude shock, yet it was to be expected. When the process of drafting the Lokpal bill got too serious, our “democratic representatives” balked. The government members of the joint drafting committee said the PM and the MPs (among many others) can’t be included in the Lokpal’s ambit because that will make the PM “dysfunctional” and violate “parliamentary privileges” of the MPs. The BJP said law-making was a parliamentary exercise and it would commit or comment only when the matter comes to the house. The Left dittoed.
The message is simple, and clear: our public representatives can’t be called to accountability. And that is how it has always been. They are the ones who make the law and they decided long ago that they are accountable to the parliament (that is, themselves) and to the people (once every five years, not in-between). Period.
Veteran political commentator Prem Shankar Jha says it is much more than just the culture of exemptions and privileges that our MPs (and MLAs) love so much. “It is a culture of ownership. We own India and all its resources. Therefore, we can take anything we want and are accountable to none, except ourselves. We are effectively above the law. We are the elite. The law is for the ruled. We are the rulers.”
Once elected, even if most of them get much less than half the votes polled, the normal law breaks down for our representatives. The traffic rules and toll taxes are not for them. They can’t be bothered with security checks or queues at airports and railway stations. Planes and trains wait for them. Key public buildings have separate entries and hospitals separate wards. They can’t move around without elaborate security cover. It doesn’t matter that 162 of our Lok Sabha members have criminal cases pending against them.
It also doesn’t matter that the average asset of our current Lok Sabha members is Rs 5.33 crore and that 315 of them are crorepatis. They get free accommodation in Lutyens’ sprawling bungalows, with free furniture and fittings, free electricity, water, phones, laptops and internet connections. They get low priced food in canteens and have a mini hospital to themselves at the parliament annexe. They get virtually endless free travel by plane and train, along with their companions, in additions to their spouses and sidekicks. Then they get a generous salary (Rs 50,000 a month) with a number of tax-free allowances running into a lakh or more of rupees every month, interest-free loans for cars and VIP discounts at state emporia and state cooperatives. And they also get to splurge Rs 5 crore a year by way of MPLADS funds.
Former Lok Sabha secretary general Subhash Kashyap wonders at the need to extend such privileges to those who least deserve it and yet are unwilling to any kind of scrutiny or accountability. We must do two things to change the Kafkaesque situation, he says: change the political culture and bring systemic reforms to ensure that those with criminal background and ill-gotten wealth are kept out. He is also against ‘nominated’ persons occupying exalted offices of the prime ministers and ministers.
Former cabinet secretary TSR Subramaniam rues that the constitution makers failed to foresee the kind of politicians who would follow them. Nehru and Ambedkar, he says, probably thought their inheritors would be like them and so didn’t prescribe a code of conduct or put elaborate checks and balances. The result is for all to see. While it is not too late to make amends, his advice to our representatives is succinct: Don’t forget, Article 14 of the constitution guarantees ‘equality before law’.
But does anyone really care? n
prasanna@governancenow.com
Ramesh makes a silly point of a serious issue
Edit, June 1-15, 2011
Whimsical and arbitrary action or talk doesn’t behove a union minister
It has now become a habit with the environment minister Jairam Ramesh to give headline grabbing bytes at regular intervals, even if it means mouthing inanities. The latest one from him about the IITs and IIMs is no better. He said the faculty of these institutions was not world class, did no worthwhile research but that its students were world class and so, these institutions were excellent because of the quality of their students, not the faculty or its research. It is no brainer to figure out that no institution can attain excellence or continue to remain so for decades without an excellent faculty. As for worthwhile research, it may be pointed out that this requires right environment and incentives which we don’t have. Our investment in research across the board is pathetically low and matches no developed country. Ramesh’s colleague Kapil Sibal has pointed out that the US spends $250 billion on research while India spends a mere $8 billion. But if Ramesh thinks he is brighter than the rest of us in figuring out something that others have missed then he should say what needs to be done and then persuade his government to do it. Idle prattle is not what is expected of a minister.
This apart, what he said next and in which context is really worrisome. He said his ministry was setting up a National Centre for Marine Biodiversity in Jamnagar in a joint venture with the Reliance Industries Limited (RIL). He went on to justify association with RIL saying that a world class research centre couldn’t be built in a ‘government set up’ because it would never attract young and talented people. It is well known that the marine biodiversity of Gujarat is facing a big threat because of several ports, power plants and SEZ that have come up along the coast, not to forget RIL’s own Jamnagar refinery, all of which Ramesh’s ministry cleared without proper environment impact assessment studies. His ministry is notorious for this. So much so that his ministry’s expert appraisal committee led by Prof C R Babu actually said pollution was good for Alphanso mangoes and cashew while giving a green signal to Jindal’s thermal power plants in neighbouring Maharashtra in 2009.
Involvement of RIL in the research project is bound to raise suspicion because of the apparent ‘conflict of interest’. Ramesh, however, chose to dismiss it by saying that life itself is “one long conflict of interests”. To expect a corporate body to do an honest job when its own interests are involved is foolhardy but to expect it to be world class and better than our IITs and IIMs, as Ramesh seems to suggest, is ridiculous. More so since it involves Ramesh’s own ministry. A few days ago, after giving clearance to Posco project in Orissa and Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh despite glaring violations of environment and other laws and guidelines, which he himself admitted, Ramesh said he was sometimes “forced to make compromises”. Compromise surely is no qualification for excellence. His ministry officials have pointed out how RIL’s selection was not on the basis of bids or any other transparent process. What value would he be bestowing on the research centre is anybody’s guess. One would, in normal course, ignore BJP leader Rajiv Pratap Rudy’s banter that we cannot have world institutions unless we have world class ministers. But in the present context he makes a very valid point.
As we have pointed out in a series of articles in our previous issues, Ramesh needs to get his act together as the environment minister. Instead of sticking to the environment and forest laws and various guidelines he himself has issued from time to time, Ramesh has been arbitrary and whimsical in clearing projects. In the case of Posco and Maheshwar projects, he knowingly violated laws and constitutional mandate and gave the go ahead. This is contrary to the oath of office he took.
Incidentally, our system doesn’t prosecute ministers for such transgressions. Otherwise, he would have been cooling his heels in some jail. It is not too late yet and our advice to him would be that he would serve the cause of the people and the environment better if he puts his own house in order. Life may be one long conflict of interests but that hardly justifies arbitrariness.
Whimsical and arbitrary action or talk doesn’t behove a union minister
It has now become a habit with the environment minister Jairam Ramesh to give headline grabbing bytes at regular intervals, even if it means mouthing inanities. The latest one from him about the IITs and IIMs is no better. He said the faculty of these institutions was not world class, did no worthwhile research but that its students were world class and so, these institutions were excellent because of the quality of their students, not the faculty or its research. It is no brainer to figure out that no institution can attain excellence or continue to remain so for decades without an excellent faculty. As for worthwhile research, it may be pointed out that this requires right environment and incentives which we don’t have. Our investment in research across the board is pathetically low and matches no developed country. Ramesh’s colleague Kapil Sibal has pointed out that the US spends $250 billion on research while India spends a mere $8 billion. But if Ramesh thinks he is brighter than the rest of us in figuring out something that others have missed then he should say what needs to be done and then persuade his government to do it. Idle prattle is not what is expected of a minister.
This apart, what he said next and in which context is really worrisome. He said his ministry was setting up a National Centre for Marine Biodiversity in Jamnagar in a joint venture with the Reliance Industries Limited (RIL). He went on to justify association with RIL saying that a world class research centre couldn’t be built in a ‘government set up’ because it would never attract young and talented people. It is well known that the marine biodiversity of Gujarat is facing a big threat because of several ports, power plants and SEZ that have come up along the coast, not to forget RIL’s own Jamnagar refinery, all of which Ramesh’s ministry cleared without proper environment impact assessment studies. His ministry is notorious for this. So much so that his ministry’s expert appraisal committee led by Prof C R Babu actually said pollution was good for Alphanso mangoes and cashew while giving a green signal to Jindal’s thermal power plants in neighbouring Maharashtra in 2009.
Involvement of RIL in the research project is bound to raise suspicion because of the apparent ‘conflict of interest’. Ramesh, however, chose to dismiss it by saying that life itself is “one long conflict of interests”. To expect a corporate body to do an honest job when its own interests are involved is foolhardy but to expect it to be world class and better than our IITs and IIMs, as Ramesh seems to suggest, is ridiculous. More so since it involves Ramesh’s own ministry. A few days ago, after giving clearance to Posco project in Orissa and Maheshwar hydel project in Madhya Pradesh despite glaring violations of environment and other laws and guidelines, which he himself admitted, Ramesh said he was sometimes “forced to make compromises”. Compromise surely is no qualification for excellence. His ministry officials have pointed out how RIL’s selection was not on the basis of bids or any other transparent process. What value would he be bestowing on the research centre is anybody’s guess. One would, in normal course, ignore BJP leader Rajiv Pratap Rudy’s banter that we cannot have world institutions unless we have world class ministers. But in the present context he makes a very valid point.
As we have pointed out in a series of articles in our previous issues, Ramesh needs to get his act together as the environment minister. Instead of sticking to the environment and forest laws and various guidelines he himself has issued from time to time, Ramesh has been arbitrary and whimsical in clearing projects. In the case of Posco and Maheshwar projects, he knowingly violated laws and constitutional mandate and gave the go ahead. This is contrary to the oath of office he took.
Incidentally, our system doesn’t prosecute ministers for such transgressions. Otherwise, he would have been cooling his heels in some jail. It is not too late yet and our advice to him would be that he would serve the cause of the people and the environment better if he puts his own house in order. Life may be one long conflict of interests but that hardly justifies arbitrariness.
Ramesh’s mea culpa is a sham
Column, Governance Now, May 16-31
The list of his own illegal actions is pretty long
Under pressure for permitting projects in violation of environment and forest laws, minister Jairam Ramesh played the victim the other day.
He said: “I am completely against regularising an illegality. But sometimes I am forced to. A steel plant has been built or a power project has been constructed… violations are detected afterwards. I cannot shut them down. Hundreds of crores (of rupees) are invested. There are livelihood issues.”
He went on to add: “A violation of law has to be prevented at the start. It is very difficult to correct it later. They become fait accompli and sometimes there is little option but to look for a compromise. I have had to make compromises on some projects.”
Sounds good as far as confessions go but Ramesh deceives here too.
Here is how.
Ramesh says a violation has to be prevented at the start. But he didn’t do so in case of the Posco project. The project is yet to take off. Two enquiry teams he sent said the forest rights had not been granted to the project-affected people and, hence, clearance should be withheld. He did the opposite and cleared it for the ‘third’ time on May 2.
His defence was: (a) “Faith and trust in what the state government says is an essential pillar of cooperative federalism”, (b) that “it was at my personal insistence that in August 2009, the ministry of environment and forests made adherence to the Forest Rights Act, 2006 an essential pre-requisite for allowing diversion of forest land” and (c) “I was under no obligation or pressure to do so except my own commitment to FRA, 2006”.
Ours is not a banana republic as Ramesh seems to suggest. Project clearances are governed by a set of laws, including the FRA. He is not obliged, he is “bound” to uphold law of the land. He took this oath while being inducted into the council of ministers.
For his benefit, it should be pointed out that section 4(5) of the FRA says “no member of a forest dwelling scheduled tribe or other traditional forest dweller shall be evicted or removed from forest land under his occupation till the recognition (of forest rights) and verification procedure is completed.”
He knows very well that the Orissa government has not implemented forest rights in Posco area. He admits as much. Yet, instead of insisting on compliance of the law, he is justifying his illegal approval.
Similar is the case with the Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh. Ramesh himself admitted in his clearance letter that the FRA had not been implemented by Andhra Pradesh and two neighbouring states to be affected – Orissa and Chhattisgarh.
If he had to issue a ‘stop order’ later, it was because of public pressure. On his part, he violated the law.
In the latest case, he has lifted ‘stop work’ on the Maheshwar dam in Madhya Pradesh on specious grounds that chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told him verbally that the rehabilitation and resettlement (RR) had been slow “because the project-affected people have begun to think that the dam project will not be completed on account of the MoEF’s rigid stance”.
In the same order, he mentions thrice that the state government’s claims that 70 percent of RR is complete “are not at all convincing”.
Ramesh also points out how non-compliance of RR requirement violates various legal requirements and the supreme court’s specific orders. But all these don’t stop him from taking the only legal recourse left to him, that is, withholding the clearance.
He is right when he says he is “forced to” make “compromises”. But he forgets violation of law is a criminal offence. He is guilty of both allowing the past illegalities and committing fresh ones. His oath of office requires him to stand up and uphold the rule of law. By not doing that he has failed the constitution as well as the people he is supposed to serve.
The sad part is such gross violations don’t attract criminal prosecution in our system.
prasanna@governancenow.com
The list of his own illegal actions is pretty long
Under pressure for permitting projects in violation of environment and forest laws, minister Jairam Ramesh played the victim the other day.
He said: “I am completely against regularising an illegality. But sometimes I am forced to. A steel plant has been built or a power project has been constructed… violations are detected afterwards. I cannot shut them down. Hundreds of crores (of rupees) are invested. There are livelihood issues.”
He went on to add: “A violation of law has to be prevented at the start. It is very difficult to correct it later. They become fait accompli and sometimes there is little option but to look for a compromise. I have had to make compromises on some projects.”
Sounds good as far as confessions go but Ramesh deceives here too.
Here is how.
Ramesh says a violation has to be prevented at the start. But he didn’t do so in case of the Posco project. The project is yet to take off. Two enquiry teams he sent said the forest rights had not been granted to the project-affected people and, hence, clearance should be withheld. He did the opposite and cleared it for the ‘third’ time on May 2.
His defence was: (a) “Faith and trust in what the state government says is an essential pillar of cooperative federalism”, (b) that “it was at my personal insistence that in August 2009, the ministry of environment and forests made adherence to the Forest Rights Act, 2006 an essential pre-requisite for allowing diversion of forest land” and (c) “I was under no obligation or pressure to do so except my own commitment to FRA, 2006”.
Ours is not a banana republic as Ramesh seems to suggest. Project clearances are governed by a set of laws, including the FRA. He is not obliged, he is “bound” to uphold law of the land. He took this oath while being inducted into the council of ministers.
For his benefit, it should be pointed out that section 4(5) of the FRA says “no member of a forest dwelling scheduled tribe or other traditional forest dweller shall be evicted or removed from forest land under his occupation till the recognition (of forest rights) and verification procedure is completed.”
He knows very well that the Orissa government has not implemented forest rights in Posco area. He admits as much. Yet, instead of insisting on compliance of the law, he is justifying his illegal approval.
Similar is the case with the Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh. Ramesh himself admitted in his clearance letter that the FRA had not been implemented by Andhra Pradesh and two neighbouring states to be affected – Orissa and Chhattisgarh.
If he had to issue a ‘stop order’ later, it was because of public pressure. On his part, he violated the law.
In the latest case, he has lifted ‘stop work’ on the Maheshwar dam in Madhya Pradesh on specious grounds that chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan told him verbally that the rehabilitation and resettlement (RR) had been slow “because the project-affected people have begun to think that the dam project will not be completed on account of the MoEF’s rigid stance”.
In the same order, he mentions thrice that the state government’s claims that 70 percent of RR is complete “are not at all convincing”.
Ramesh also points out how non-compliance of RR requirement violates various legal requirements and the supreme court’s specific orders. But all these don’t stop him from taking the only legal recourse left to him, that is, withholding the clearance.
He is right when he says he is “forced to” make “compromises”. But he forgets violation of law is a criminal offence. He is guilty of both allowing the past illegalities and committing fresh ones. His oath of office requires him to stand up and uphold the rule of law. By not doing that he has failed the constitution as well as the people he is supposed to serve.
The sad part is such gross violations don’t attract criminal prosecution in our system.
prasanna@governancenow.com
Solution without a problem
Governance Now, May 15-31, 2011
Anna needs to fast again, this time to address another key concern that the politicians don’t: high cost of elections that breeds and promotes corruption
The next time you see a TV anchor haranguing a numb studio guest, shouting, “Why don’t the Maoists stand for elections? Why don’t they come in to the mainstream?”, do SMS the channel saying, “Because they can’t afford your rates”.
— Arundhati Roy in her essay, ‘Mr Chidambaram’s War’
A day after Anna Hazare ended his fast, two senior politicians, Satyavrat Chaturvedi of the Congress and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi of the BJP, were in a television studio discussing political corruption. Both, true to their wont, were defending the role of black money and muscle in electoral politics. Chaturvedi said political parties gave tickets to the criminals because they won elections. “For 40 years of my political career, I have seen honest candidates getting defeated by the dishonest ones.” It was the “winnability” which decided the ticket, he said. Naqvi said: “The truth is, an honest and poor worker like me loses elections because the rival spends a huge amount of money. You will find many in the parliament who have won because of their black money.”
That pretty much sums up the representative democracy that we have. An analysis of affidavits filed by the MPs by the National Election Watch (NEW) and the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) provides some startling facts and figures:
* MPs with pending criminal cases: 162 in 2009 (29.83 percent), as against 128 in 2004
* MPs with serious pending criminal cases: 76 (14 percent) in 2009, as against 58 in 2004
* Number of crorepatis: 315 in 2009 as against 156 in 2004
* Average asset of an MP: Rs 5.33 crore in 2009 as against Rs 1.86 crore in 2004
* For 157 MPs re-elected in 2009, their assets grew, on average, by 288 percent between 2004 and 2009
* Two notable cases of this: The Congress’ Bharatsinh Solanki’s assets grew by 3,003 percent – from Rs 9.96 lakh to Rs 3.09 crore. Union minister Sachin Pilot’s assets grew by 1,746 percent – from Rs 25.19 lakh to Rs 4.46 crore.
Just how much a candidate spends in the Lok Sabha elections? Ask politicians and they will tell you it is Rs 10-15 crore. Ask chief election commissioner SY Quraishi, he will say it is 20-30 times more than the ceiling, which means Rs 8-12 crore (taking current limit at Rs 40 lakh).
Remember, there were 8,028 candidates in fray in 2009 elections, though not all of them spent this kind of money. But if you go by their official declarations, the average expense comes to less than half the limit. Both the election commission and political parties acknowledge that it is a case of gross under-
reporting. Yet, the limit was raised from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 40 lakh (for Lok Sabha candidates) this February, but that is another story.
Also remember that the political parties also spend money which is not counted in the candidates’ expenses. As per the official records, the BJP spent Rs 162 crore in 2009 elections – of which only Rs 15 lakh was meant for the individual candidates/state units. The Congress spent Rs 380 crore – of which Rs 36 crore was meant for individual candidates.
Add the expenses of the candidates to that of the political parties and factor in under-reporting and you will know how much it costs to fight elections.
The significance of all these were pointed out by the National Commission to Review the Working of Constitution. In its 2001 report, it said, among other things, that “the sources of some of the election funds are believed to be unaccounted criminal money in return for protection, unaccounted funds from business groups who expect high return on this investment, kickbacks or commissions on contracts etc”.
When the politicians say that the Lokpal is not adequate to fight corruption, they are right.
Why elections cost a bomb
As the analysis by NEW and ADR shows, electoral politics is the most lucrative business around and our MPs are the best asset managers. Therefore, anyone with enough money to invest is getting into politics, raising both the cost and the subsequent return from it.
It wasn’t always so. Veteran CPI leader A B Bardhan says the high cost of election is a by-product of new economic and political policies in which maximisation of profit and making quick wealth motivate every activity. BJP’s Nirmala Sitharaman attributes it to the black money spreading its catchment area far and wide.
Jagdeep S Chhokar, former dean of IIM-Ahmedabad and a founding member of ADR, blames the political parties. He says they have stopped doing what used to be their conventional/fundamental activities – (a) mobilising public opinion and (b) acting as a bridge between the government and the people. Now, there is a complete disconnect between the people and their government.
“After the emergency, political parties have slowly and gradually turned into election winning entities, not far from private companies. They like making money, occasionally claiming to serve the people. Their objective is to win elections, whatever it takes, short of political work”, says Chhokar. Had they been working with the people they wouldn’t need a lot of money to win their votes.
To drive home his point, Chhokar says an ex-cricketer who contested 2009 elections and won began his campaign by offering Rs 100 a day for distribution of his party flags and pamphlets. There were no takers and he had to raise the stakes to Rs 200 a day to get willing hands.
How to bring the cost down
“You are looking for a solution to whose problem?” Chhokar seeks to know when the question is popped to him.
Indeed, it is nobody’s problem. Ask the election commission officials and they will tell you every move to improve the electoral system, including the measures aimed at cutting the cost, is foiled by the political parties. But they forget that it was on their advice that the expense limit was raised despite the candidates claiming that they are spending less than half of it. (see interview with Quraishi)
Ask the political parties, they will jump at the state-funding of elections, and for obvious reasons. They will then get public money to splurge. The last time serious attention was paid to the issue was when the NDA regime set up the Indrajit Gupta Committee in 1998 to consider state-funding. Though the committee spoke in favour, its report was dumped.
The only new idea that political parties have to offer comes from Congress leader Satyavrat Chaturvedi, who advocates proportional representation in place of the existing first-past-the-post system. “But my model would have suitable modifications to match our conditions. Which is that only the national parties shall be allowed to contest for the Lok Sabha and the regional parties the state assemblies. There shall be no candidates and the elections shall be fought on the basis of manifestos to be aired and debated in national media. Then, internal elections shall be held to select the members”, he elaborates.
It may bring the cost down alright, but whether it will strengthen our democratic participation and prove more useful is highly questionable. In any case, it needs healthy internal democratic practices in our political parties to work.
Chhokar’s suggestions, on the other hand, address more fundamental flaws in the system. He advocates two measures: (a) bringing in internal democracy within political parties and (b) ensuring financial transparency and accountability in their activities. He says since change can happen only by an external change-inducing force, these two measures should be legislated.
The problem is political parties don’t want any of it.
When former CEC T N Seshan tried to bring in internal democracy, the BJP countered it, insisting that “consensus” to decide office bearers was also a “democratic process”. Now it has a president who was forced on it by a “cultural” organisation, the RSS. The Congress had its last election to find a president in 2000 when late Jitendra Prasada challenged Sonia Gandhi and lost. Now, even the limited election to the CWC, its highest decision-making body, has been dispensed with, as if to justify Rahul Gandhi’s assertion that, “In a democratic India, there is no internal democracy in our political parties”. The less said about personality-driven parties like SP, BSP, RJD, RLD, TMC, DMK, AIDMK and others, the better.
“Winnability” is, therefore, the most reliable acid test these undemocratic leaders apply to find candidates and win elections.
Similar is the case with financial transparency and accountability. When the election commission asked political parties to go for independent audit of their accounts by a panel selected either by itself or by the CAG at an all-party meeting in October 2010, everyone present said “No!” Their reasons varied : “it amounts to interference in our internal functioning”(Nilotpal Basu of CPI-M); “our accounts are already audited by the CAs (D Raja of CPI)”; “let IT department take action if it isn’t satisfied” (Ravi Shankar Prasad of BJP); “we will agree if others agree (Abhishek Manu Singhvi of Congress)”.
The resistance is because of the existing cozy arrangement. All political parties file their annual returns to the IT department. The candidates submit their expense details and assets to the election commission. But these go unscrutinised.
Political parties collect most of the funds in cash – 95 percent by the Congress, 84 percent by the BJP and 100 percent by the BSP – as per the official records of 2007-08 and 2008-09. So, the source of income, a key deterrent, remains unchallenged. (BJP’s Ravi Shankar Prasad says nobody’s willing to contribute by cheque.)
This leads to piquant situations. In December 2008, about Rs 2.5 crore
disappeared from the BJP’s central office in New Delhi and, yet, not even an FIR was filed. Similarly, nobody turned up to claim more than Rs 60.10 crore, mostly in hard cash, seized during the recently concluded elections in Tamil Nadu.
There are other loopholes. Expenses incurred by the political parties during elections – mostly by way of hiring aircraft and ads in newspapers/TV channels-are not included in the candidates’ expenses, making a mockery of the expense limit. Political parties have thwarted every attempt to club the expenses.
UP chief minister Mayawati is a fine example of misusing political funding to feather her nests. She has bought a palatial house in New Delhi with party funds.
Without financial transparency and accountability, it is a free-for-all situation, which suits the political parties fine.
The third major step could be to prevent criminals, who use muscle and black money liberally, from contesting elections. The political parties are opposed to this too, on the ground that our judicial system presumes one innocent until proven guilty. If you think it means conviction by any court of law would do, you are wrong. It means conviction by the highest court of law (supreme court) after all the legal recourses available to one by way of multiple appeals and review petitions have been exhausted. In effect, it means never having to keep the criminal out.
The election commission offered a simple solution, which is backed by the Administrative Reforms Commission of 2007: Amend law to bar/disqualify anyone charged by a court of law with a criminal case punishable with imprisonment of five years or more. To check misuse, it proposed only those cases may be considered that were filed six months before the election. Nobody agrees to this.
Fourth step could be to follow what Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan advocated for the Rajya Sabha at the Bhopal round of consultations on electoral reforms. He said (in December 2010): “There is open selling of tickets, it is like a market. It is a shame.” He suggested a quota should be fixed for the upper house and the members be nominated just as the representation for the Anglo-Indians is done.
The Rajya Sabha lost its status and defining character as a “council of states”, that is, representing the states’ interest, during the NDA regime when the domicile requirement for getting elected was withdrawn. We now have the spectacle of a Chandigarh-based industrialist K D Singh winning a Rajya Sabha seat from Jharkhand with the help of JMM and other smaller parties as an independent candidate and then declaring himself as a Trinamool Congress member in Rajya Sabha. Which state is he representing now? West Bengal. Which party is he representing now? The Trinamool Congress. Incidentally, Trinamool Congress doesn’t exist in Jharkhand, the state which sent him to the upper house.
Following Chouhan’s advice is not a bad idea.
Fifth, the EC officials favour handing over the campaign part to them. As per their plan, EC will provide a designated platform for all public debates and rallies and putting up banners and posters. This would mean no individual rallies or public meetings or buntings and posters anywhere else. It addresses visible elements of campaign but not the invisible ones – which thrives on black money.
Finally, none of these steps will succeed until and unless corruption and black money are checked or eliminated. This being a governance issue, it calls for holistic and radical changes in our legal framework, but, above all, political will.
As Chhokar says, no change can happen without external change-inducing force. This would, therefore, require Anna Hazare to sit on another round of fast at Jantar Mantar.
prasanna@governancenow.com
***
“State-funding is dangerous. It will not stop illegal expenses”
In a free-wheeling interview with Prasanna Mohanty, chief election commissioner
S Y Quraishi answers questions about what ails our electoral system and what he thinks will bring the cost of elections down
The election commission recently hiked the limit for election expenses from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 40 lakh for Lok Sabha candidates. What was the basis? Going by their own submissions, the average expenses of the candidates are less than half the old limit in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. The limit should have been reduced by half.
They are under-reporting it, which is another issue. All political parties and candidates say they need to spend a lot more and that there is a need for rationalisation of expenses. We say the limit was fixed in 1996 – when it was increased from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 25 lakh. It should at least be rationalised to the extent of price rationalisation, rather than the real rationalisation, which the politicians were demanding. We need a debate in parliament for real rationalisation.
What is the basis for believing that the candidates are under-reporting?
Generally from experience and the anecdotal accounts. People tell us informally, something we can’t prove. Political parties too concede under-reporting.
As per the records available, only four MPs reported expenses over Rs 25 lakh in 2009 elections and all them lost. What action has been taken against them?
Spending more than the limit falls under the corrupt practices which can only be tried in high courts. For this, the losing candidate can file a petition. It is beyond us. Yes, there is a legal ambiguity here as such cases go untried if no one goes to the court. The election commission would like the law to be amended. Those exceeding the limit, even if they lose the election, should not get away.
Asaduddin Owaisi, MP from Hyderabad, was quoted in the WikiLeaks saying that the limit is a joke and that he would spend Rs 25 lakh on the polling day alone. His election expenses are not available on your website. What action has been taken against him?
How can you take action? It is not legally provable.
What happens to the cash and goods seized during the electioneering?
If we are satisfied, we release them. We are concerned about the end use, not the source. If it is meant for bribing the voters, we don’t return it. We pass on the information to the IT department. It is seized by the IT and goes to the treasury.
What steps the election commission is taking or proposes to take against political parties who collect funds mostly in cash and also spend huge amounts in cash during the elections?
We have been asking all the political parties to accept funds by cheque only and get all their accounts audited by the CAG approved audit firms. They are not agreeing to these. We would like them to reconsider these.
You have described state-funding of elections as “dangerous”. Would you please elaborate?
This is no solution. Basically, we are not worried about the legal expenses but the illegal expenses in elections. State-funding will not stop illegal
expenses. In fact, more money will be available to the candidates.
What is your opinion on including the political parties’ election expenses in the candidates’ expenses?
Under the law, election expenses incurred by the political parties in connection with the election campaign of a particular candidate is already included in the candidate’s expenses. The exception is only the travel expenses of the party leaders who are known as star campaigners.
You have said opinion polls can be manipulated because of the ‘paid news’ phenomenon. Do you propose it to be banned? If no, why?
The election commission has already recommended to the government for the ban of opinion polls. All political parties have also demanded this.
Political parties are submitting their IT returns. What follow-up action is taken by the EC to bring accountability and transparency in the way they collect funds and spend it?
Income tax returns are filed by the political parties with the income tax authorities. However, the election commission has recommended that the accounts of the political parties should be audited by the auditors
appointed by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, and such audited accounts should be published annually.
You have said a candidate charge sheeted by court should be debarred. What follow-up action you have taken to make this a reality?
Our proposal requires amendment to the law. The election commission has already taken up the matter with the government and it is also one of the items in the agenda for the electoral reforms which is now being discussed at the regional consultations.
Finally, what measures would you suggest to cut down election expenses of political parties and candidates?
The commission has taken several measures to control election expenditure of political parties and candidates. Apart from advising political parties to exercise self-restraint, the commission has asked candidates to open separate bank accounts and incur all expenditure by cheque from the said account. So far as the bribing of voters is concerned, which is illegal, the commission has taken firm measures like flying squads and surveillance teams and has associated income tax department to keep close vigil over movement of cash.
My suggestion is if there is total transparency in the accounts of political parties and auditing of accounts by independent auditors, this will restrain excessive expenditure by the parties. We have already suggested for amendment of law to bring a ceiling on election expenditure by political parties and at present there is no ceiling on election expenditure by political parties. I have further suggested that the bribing of voters should be made a cognisable offence, so that the offenders can be detained at the time of election. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
Anna needs to fast again, this time to address another key concern that the politicians don’t: high cost of elections that breeds and promotes corruption
The next time you see a TV anchor haranguing a numb studio guest, shouting, “Why don’t the Maoists stand for elections? Why don’t they come in to the mainstream?”, do SMS the channel saying, “Because they can’t afford your rates”.
— Arundhati Roy in her essay, ‘Mr Chidambaram’s War’
A day after Anna Hazare ended his fast, two senior politicians, Satyavrat Chaturvedi of the Congress and Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi of the BJP, were in a television studio discussing political corruption. Both, true to their wont, were defending the role of black money and muscle in electoral politics. Chaturvedi said political parties gave tickets to the criminals because they won elections. “For 40 years of my political career, I have seen honest candidates getting defeated by the dishonest ones.” It was the “winnability” which decided the ticket, he said. Naqvi said: “The truth is, an honest and poor worker like me loses elections because the rival spends a huge amount of money. You will find many in the parliament who have won because of their black money.”
That pretty much sums up the representative democracy that we have. An analysis of affidavits filed by the MPs by the National Election Watch (NEW) and the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) provides some startling facts and figures:
* MPs with pending criminal cases: 162 in 2009 (29.83 percent), as against 128 in 2004
* MPs with serious pending criminal cases: 76 (14 percent) in 2009, as against 58 in 2004
* Number of crorepatis: 315 in 2009 as against 156 in 2004
* Average asset of an MP: Rs 5.33 crore in 2009 as against Rs 1.86 crore in 2004
* For 157 MPs re-elected in 2009, their assets grew, on average, by 288 percent between 2004 and 2009
* Two notable cases of this: The Congress’ Bharatsinh Solanki’s assets grew by 3,003 percent – from Rs 9.96 lakh to Rs 3.09 crore. Union minister Sachin Pilot’s assets grew by 1,746 percent – from Rs 25.19 lakh to Rs 4.46 crore.
Just how much a candidate spends in the Lok Sabha elections? Ask politicians and they will tell you it is Rs 10-15 crore. Ask chief election commissioner SY Quraishi, he will say it is 20-30 times more than the ceiling, which means Rs 8-12 crore (taking current limit at Rs 40 lakh).
Remember, there were 8,028 candidates in fray in 2009 elections, though not all of them spent this kind of money. But if you go by their official declarations, the average expense comes to less than half the limit. Both the election commission and political parties acknowledge that it is a case of gross under-
reporting. Yet, the limit was raised from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 40 lakh (for Lok Sabha candidates) this February, but that is another story.
Also remember that the political parties also spend money which is not counted in the candidates’ expenses. As per the official records, the BJP spent Rs 162 crore in 2009 elections – of which only Rs 15 lakh was meant for the individual candidates/state units. The Congress spent Rs 380 crore – of which Rs 36 crore was meant for individual candidates.
Add the expenses of the candidates to that of the political parties and factor in under-reporting and you will know how much it costs to fight elections.
The significance of all these were pointed out by the National Commission to Review the Working of Constitution. In its 2001 report, it said, among other things, that “the sources of some of the election funds are believed to be unaccounted criminal money in return for protection, unaccounted funds from business groups who expect high return on this investment, kickbacks or commissions on contracts etc”.
When the politicians say that the Lokpal is not adequate to fight corruption, they are right.
Why elections cost a bomb
As the analysis by NEW and ADR shows, electoral politics is the most lucrative business around and our MPs are the best asset managers. Therefore, anyone with enough money to invest is getting into politics, raising both the cost and the subsequent return from it.
It wasn’t always so. Veteran CPI leader A B Bardhan says the high cost of election is a by-product of new economic and political policies in which maximisation of profit and making quick wealth motivate every activity. BJP’s Nirmala Sitharaman attributes it to the black money spreading its catchment area far and wide.
Jagdeep S Chhokar, former dean of IIM-Ahmedabad and a founding member of ADR, blames the political parties. He says they have stopped doing what used to be their conventional/fundamental activities – (a) mobilising public opinion and (b) acting as a bridge between the government and the people. Now, there is a complete disconnect between the people and their government.
“After the emergency, political parties have slowly and gradually turned into election winning entities, not far from private companies. They like making money, occasionally claiming to serve the people. Their objective is to win elections, whatever it takes, short of political work”, says Chhokar. Had they been working with the people they wouldn’t need a lot of money to win their votes.
To drive home his point, Chhokar says an ex-cricketer who contested 2009 elections and won began his campaign by offering Rs 100 a day for distribution of his party flags and pamphlets. There were no takers and he had to raise the stakes to Rs 200 a day to get willing hands.
How to bring the cost down
“You are looking for a solution to whose problem?” Chhokar seeks to know when the question is popped to him.
Indeed, it is nobody’s problem. Ask the election commission officials and they will tell you every move to improve the electoral system, including the measures aimed at cutting the cost, is foiled by the political parties. But they forget that it was on their advice that the expense limit was raised despite the candidates claiming that they are spending less than half of it. (see interview with Quraishi)
Ask the political parties, they will jump at the state-funding of elections, and for obvious reasons. They will then get public money to splurge. The last time serious attention was paid to the issue was when the NDA regime set up the Indrajit Gupta Committee in 1998 to consider state-funding. Though the committee spoke in favour, its report was dumped.
The only new idea that political parties have to offer comes from Congress leader Satyavrat Chaturvedi, who advocates proportional representation in place of the existing first-past-the-post system. “But my model would have suitable modifications to match our conditions. Which is that only the national parties shall be allowed to contest for the Lok Sabha and the regional parties the state assemblies. There shall be no candidates and the elections shall be fought on the basis of manifestos to be aired and debated in national media. Then, internal elections shall be held to select the members”, he elaborates.
It may bring the cost down alright, but whether it will strengthen our democratic participation and prove more useful is highly questionable. In any case, it needs healthy internal democratic practices in our political parties to work.
Chhokar’s suggestions, on the other hand, address more fundamental flaws in the system. He advocates two measures: (a) bringing in internal democracy within political parties and (b) ensuring financial transparency and accountability in their activities. He says since change can happen only by an external change-inducing force, these two measures should be legislated.
The problem is political parties don’t want any of it.
When former CEC T N Seshan tried to bring in internal democracy, the BJP countered it, insisting that “consensus” to decide office bearers was also a “democratic process”. Now it has a president who was forced on it by a “cultural” organisation, the RSS. The Congress had its last election to find a president in 2000 when late Jitendra Prasada challenged Sonia Gandhi and lost. Now, even the limited election to the CWC, its highest decision-making body, has been dispensed with, as if to justify Rahul Gandhi’s assertion that, “In a democratic India, there is no internal democracy in our political parties”. The less said about personality-driven parties like SP, BSP, RJD, RLD, TMC, DMK, AIDMK and others, the better.
“Winnability” is, therefore, the most reliable acid test these undemocratic leaders apply to find candidates and win elections.
Similar is the case with financial transparency and accountability. When the election commission asked political parties to go for independent audit of their accounts by a panel selected either by itself or by the CAG at an all-party meeting in October 2010, everyone present said “No!” Their reasons varied : “it amounts to interference in our internal functioning”(Nilotpal Basu of CPI-M); “our accounts are already audited by the CAs (D Raja of CPI)”; “let IT department take action if it isn’t satisfied” (Ravi Shankar Prasad of BJP); “we will agree if others agree (Abhishek Manu Singhvi of Congress)”.
The resistance is because of the existing cozy arrangement. All political parties file their annual returns to the IT department. The candidates submit their expense details and assets to the election commission. But these go unscrutinised.
Political parties collect most of the funds in cash – 95 percent by the Congress, 84 percent by the BJP and 100 percent by the BSP – as per the official records of 2007-08 and 2008-09. So, the source of income, a key deterrent, remains unchallenged. (BJP’s Ravi Shankar Prasad says nobody’s willing to contribute by cheque.)
This leads to piquant situations. In December 2008, about Rs 2.5 crore
disappeared from the BJP’s central office in New Delhi and, yet, not even an FIR was filed. Similarly, nobody turned up to claim more than Rs 60.10 crore, mostly in hard cash, seized during the recently concluded elections in Tamil Nadu.
There are other loopholes. Expenses incurred by the political parties during elections – mostly by way of hiring aircraft and ads in newspapers/TV channels-are not included in the candidates’ expenses, making a mockery of the expense limit. Political parties have thwarted every attempt to club the expenses.
UP chief minister Mayawati is a fine example of misusing political funding to feather her nests. She has bought a palatial house in New Delhi with party funds.
Without financial transparency and accountability, it is a free-for-all situation, which suits the political parties fine.
The third major step could be to prevent criminals, who use muscle and black money liberally, from contesting elections. The political parties are opposed to this too, on the ground that our judicial system presumes one innocent until proven guilty. If you think it means conviction by any court of law would do, you are wrong. It means conviction by the highest court of law (supreme court) after all the legal recourses available to one by way of multiple appeals and review petitions have been exhausted. In effect, it means never having to keep the criminal out.
The election commission offered a simple solution, which is backed by the Administrative Reforms Commission of 2007: Amend law to bar/disqualify anyone charged by a court of law with a criminal case punishable with imprisonment of five years or more. To check misuse, it proposed only those cases may be considered that were filed six months before the election. Nobody agrees to this.
Fourth step could be to follow what Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan advocated for the Rajya Sabha at the Bhopal round of consultations on electoral reforms. He said (in December 2010): “There is open selling of tickets, it is like a market. It is a shame.” He suggested a quota should be fixed for the upper house and the members be nominated just as the representation for the Anglo-Indians is done.
The Rajya Sabha lost its status and defining character as a “council of states”, that is, representing the states’ interest, during the NDA regime when the domicile requirement for getting elected was withdrawn. We now have the spectacle of a Chandigarh-based industrialist K D Singh winning a Rajya Sabha seat from Jharkhand with the help of JMM and other smaller parties as an independent candidate and then declaring himself as a Trinamool Congress member in Rajya Sabha. Which state is he representing now? West Bengal. Which party is he representing now? The Trinamool Congress. Incidentally, Trinamool Congress doesn’t exist in Jharkhand, the state which sent him to the upper house.
Following Chouhan’s advice is not a bad idea.
Fifth, the EC officials favour handing over the campaign part to them. As per their plan, EC will provide a designated platform for all public debates and rallies and putting up banners and posters. This would mean no individual rallies or public meetings or buntings and posters anywhere else. It addresses visible elements of campaign but not the invisible ones – which thrives on black money.
Finally, none of these steps will succeed until and unless corruption and black money are checked or eliminated. This being a governance issue, it calls for holistic and radical changes in our legal framework, but, above all, political will.
As Chhokar says, no change can happen without external change-inducing force. This would, therefore, require Anna Hazare to sit on another round of fast at Jantar Mantar.
prasanna@governancenow.com
***
“State-funding is dangerous. It will not stop illegal expenses”
In a free-wheeling interview with Prasanna Mohanty, chief election commissioner
S Y Quraishi answers questions about what ails our electoral system and what he thinks will bring the cost of elections down
The election commission recently hiked the limit for election expenses from Rs 25 lakh to Rs 40 lakh for Lok Sabha candidates. What was the basis? Going by their own submissions, the average expenses of the candidates are less than half the old limit in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. The limit should have been reduced by half.
They are under-reporting it, which is another issue. All political parties and candidates say they need to spend a lot more and that there is a need for rationalisation of expenses. We say the limit was fixed in 1996 – when it was increased from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 25 lakh. It should at least be rationalised to the extent of price rationalisation, rather than the real rationalisation, which the politicians were demanding. We need a debate in parliament for real rationalisation.
What is the basis for believing that the candidates are under-reporting?
Generally from experience and the anecdotal accounts. People tell us informally, something we can’t prove. Political parties too concede under-reporting.
As per the records available, only four MPs reported expenses over Rs 25 lakh in 2009 elections and all them lost. What action has been taken against them?
Spending more than the limit falls under the corrupt practices which can only be tried in high courts. For this, the losing candidate can file a petition. It is beyond us. Yes, there is a legal ambiguity here as such cases go untried if no one goes to the court. The election commission would like the law to be amended. Those exceeding the limit, even if they lose the election, should not get away.
Asaduddin Owaisi, MP from Hyderabad, was quoted in the WikiLeaks saying that the limit is a joke and that he would spend Rs 25 lakh on the polling day alone. His election expenses are not available on your website. What action has been taken against him?
How can you take action? It is not legally provable.
What happens to the cash and goods seized during the electioneering?
If we are satisfied, we release them. We are concerned about the end use, not the source. If it is meant for bribing the voters, we don’t return it. We pass on the information to the IT department. It is seized by the IT and goes to the treasury.
What steps the election commission is taking or proposes to take against political parties who collect funds mostly in cash and also spend huge amounts in cash during the elections?
We have been asking all the political parties to accept funds by cheque only and get all their accounts audited by the CAG approved audit firms. They are not agreeing to these. We would like them to reconsider these.
You have described state-funding of elections as “dangerous”. Would you please elaborate?
This is no solution. Basically, we are not worried about the legal expenses but the illegal expenses in elections. State-funding will not stop illegal
expenses. In fact, more money will be available to the candidates.
What is your opinion on including the political parties’ election expenses in the candidates’ expenses?
Under the law, election expenses incurred by the political parties in connection with the election campaign of a particular candidate is already included in the candidate’s expenses. The exception is only the travel expenses of the party leaders who are known as star campaigners.
You have said opinion polls can be manipulated because of the ‘paid news’ phenomenon. Do you propose it to be banned? If no, why?
The election commission has already recommended to the government for the ban of opinion polls. All political parties have also demanded this.
Political parties are submitting their IT returns. What follow-up action is taken by the EC to bring accountability and transparency in the way they collect funds and spend it?
Income tax returns are filed by the political parties with the income tax authorities. However, the election commission has recommended that the accounts of the political parties should be audited by the auditors
appointed by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, and such audited accounts should be published annually.
You have said a candidate charge sheeted by court should be debarred. What follow-up action you have taken to make this a reality?
Our proposal requires amendment to the law. The election commission has already taken up the matter with the government and it is also one of the items in the agenda for the electoral reforms which is now being discussed at the regional consultations.
Finally, what measures would you suggest to cut down election expenses of political parties and candidates?
The commission has taken several measures to control election expenditure of political parties and candidates. Apart from advising political parties to exercise self-restraint, the commission has asked candidates to open separate bank accounts and incur all expenditure by cheque from the said account. So far as the bribing of voters is concerned, which is illegal, the commission has taken firm measures like flying squads and surveillance teams and has associated income tax department to keep close vigil over movement of cash.
My suggestion is if there is total transparency in the accounts of political parties and auditing of accounts by independent auditors, this will restrain excessive expenditure by the parties. We have already suggested for amendment of law to bring a ceiling on election expenditure by political parties and at present there is no ceiling on election expenditure by political parties. I have further suggested that the bribing of voters should be made a cognisable offence, so that the offenders can be detained at the time of election. n
prasanna@governancenow.com
How about GoM for good governance?
edit,Governance Now,May 15-31, 2011,
PMO has lost the plot and the will to govern
You are certain that a government is drifting when it actually thinks that the drift is a matter of ‘perception’ that can be corrected by publicity. The prime minister’s decision to set up a GoM for better PR of the government is a fine example of this. Home minister P Chidambaram heads the GoM and several high-profile ministers like Ambika Soni, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Kapil Sibal and Slaman Khursheed are its members. We are told that the panel meets every day to analyse the day’s events and brief the media at 3 pm.
Aren’t the ministers better off doing their assigned job, which is to attend to pressing issues of their ministries?
The PMO seems to have completely lost the plot.
If anyone thinks the government is in drift there are sound reasons for it. For one, the government is beset with endless scams of huge proportions – IPL, Adarsh, 2G, CWG, Isro spectrum deal, CVC appointment, Niira Radia tapes, black money in secret accounts and so on.
Nobody seems to be in charge of the government because nobody is explaining why all these are happening and what measures, remedial or punitive, are being taken. The PM did address the media once but left none any wiser. All he said was that the scams happened because of ‘coalition compulsions’ or his ignorance.
More importantly, he has not done anything about it. If some are in jail and others face such a prospect it is because the supreme court has played an active role.
A PR set-up can remove the communication gaps. But here we are confronted with absence of governance which, surely, a PR exercise can’t address.
We need governance. We need corrective measures. This means, the government has to primarily take two steps – address systemic shortcomings that led to the scams and fix accountability.
The government is reluctant to do either.
There is another major issue. Food prices have remained high for three years in running. Nothing beyond tinkering with the banks’ lending rates has been done. The PM and and his men keep telling us twice every year that the prices will come down after the harvesting seasons. Meanwhile, food grains are rotting in godowns but are not distributed to the hungry despite the apex court’s directive.
Surely, a ‘functional’ government is expected to do better.
PMO has lost the plot and the will to govern
You are certain that a government is drifting when it actually thinks that the drift is a matter of ‘perception’ that can be corrected by publicity. The prime minister’s decision to set up a GoM for better PR of the government is a fine example of this. Home minister P Chidambaram heads the GoM and several high-profile ministers like Ambika Soni, Ghulam Nabi Azad, Kapil Sibal and Slaman Khursheed are its members. We are told that the panel meets every day to analyse the day’s events and brief the media at 3 pm.
Aren’t the ministers better off doing their assigned job, which is to attend to pressing issues of their ministries?
The PMO seems to have completely lost the plot.
If anyone thinks the government is in drift there are sound reasons for it. For one, the government is beset with endless scams of huge proportions – IPL, Adarsh, 2G, CWG, Isro spectrum deal, CVC appointment, Niira Radia tapes, black money in secret accounts and so on.
Nobody seems to be in charge of the government because nobody is explaining why all these are happening and what measures, remedial or punitive, are being taken. The PM did address the media once but left none any wiser. All he said was that the scams happened because of ‘coalition compulsions’ or his ignorance.
More importantly, he has not done anything about it. If some are in jail and others face such a prospect it is because the supreme court has played an active role.
A PR set-up can remove the communication gaps. But here we are confronted with absence of governance which, surely, a PR exercise can’t address.
We need governance. We need corrective measures. This means, the government has to primarily take two steps – address systemic shortcomings that led to the scams and fix accountability.
The government is reluctant to do either.
There is another major issue. Food prices have remained high for three years in running. Nothing beyond tinkering with the banks’ lending rates has been done. The PM and and his men keep telling us twice every year that the prices will come down after the harvesting seasons. Meanwhile, food grains are rotting in godowns but are not distributed to the hungry despite the apex court’s directive.
Surely, a ‘functional’ government is expected to do better.
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