The Hindu : Other States / Orissa News : Rajasthan police register six cases on complaints from social auditors

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Tuesday, Feb 05, 2008
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Rajasthan police register six cases on complaints from social auditors

Special Correspondent

State Government “a silent abettor to corrupt and disruptive elements”

JAIPUR: The Rajasthan police on Monday registered six cases on complaints lodged by Rozgar Evum Suchna Ka Adhikar Abhiyan activists who were attacked and chased out of three villages in Manohar Thana bloack of Jhalawar district while trying to conduct a social audit of the much talked about National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS).

Members of the social audit teams who were assaulted in Banskhedi, Guradi and Banskheda villages included noted economist and member of the NREG Council, Jean Dreze. Those opposing the appraisal exercise showered the activists with lathis and stones, dragged them through the roads, and hurled abuses on them in a show of unrestrained violence.

A police spokesperson here said that the cases were registered at the Manohar Thana police station on charges of causing hurt under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and included an offence booked under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.Strict security arrangements have been made in the entire block to protect the civil rights activists sitting on a dharna in front of the block office since January 29 waiting for photocopies of the work carried out under the scheme. There were reports of the local Sarpanch Sangh still threatening the activists and opposing their application for information.

Activists who went to the villages – falling in Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje’s former Lok Sabha constituency – to observe the work sites included the members of a research team from G. B. Pant University of Allahabad. The team, led by Mr. Jean Dreze, was surrounded by nearly 60 people and threatened with dire consequences before the physical assault.

Social activist and NREG Council member Aruna Roy, condemning the brutal violence, said the worst part of the incidents was that “the State Government is allowing this to happen”.

“It will corrode the democratic structure and further weaken the rule of law,” she said. Such planned violence has taken place despite the fact that Ms. Roy had personally handed over a letter to Ms. Raje on January 25 informing her of the upcoming social audit programme and asking for her support. Abhiyan spokesperson Nikhil Dey said the Chief Minister at that time had promised her full cooperation. Mr. Dey said the growing instances of violent protest against social audits of NREGS works during the past two years since the scheme was launched in a relatively peaceful State like Rajasthan pointed to a “disconcerting and widening gap” between the Government’s verbal proclamations to ensure transparency and its actions to the contrary.

Not only has the Government made it more and more difficult for civil society to obtain information under the NREG Act since the last audit in Banswara, the alarming rate at which activists and innocent people were being subjected to violent outbursts implicated the Government as “a silent abettor to such corrupt and disruptive elements”, said Mr. Dey.

After the sarpanches and local politicians showed a rare unity in opposing the audit in Banswara recently, the initiative in the remote block in Jhalawar seems to be meeting the fate of the unsuccessful attempt made by the Abhiyan in that district last December. Significantly, the denial of information amounts to a flagrant contravention of the NREG Act.

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