The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Well-established systems subverted

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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Well-established systems subverted

S. Nagesh Kumar

Had the scam taken place in a private firm, it would have been dubbed monumental act of ‘corporate misgovernance’

HYDERABAD: The raging political controversy over how V. Suryanarayana manipulated key politicians and bureaucrats from his relatively insignificant position as executive engineer of the Fisheries Department has exposed the extent to which established systems in the administration were subverted.

This is evident from the mischief committed by the engineer in bagging contracts for civil works from various departments even after express instructions of Chief Minister Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy way back in November 2006, the Chief Secretary P. Ramakanth Reddy and Special Chief Secretary, Animal Husbandry & Fisheries, Priyardarshi Dash.

Clean chit

Had such a scam taken place in a private company, it would have been dubbed monumental act of ‘corporate misgovernance’ and heads would have rolled. In public governance, however, it is rare for the culpability of politicians to be established. Whether the judicial inquiry into the scam announced by the Chief Minister will be different will be known once its terms of inquiry are finalised. The impression going round is that Dr. Reddy has already given a clean chit to the Ministers and to Chief Secretary P. Ramakanth Reddy.

It is one thing that Suryanarayana exploited loopholes in the government rules to escape disciplinary action.

What is worrisome is that the ban order issued by the heads of the government and the civil service against Suryanarayana were merrily ignored by those who entrusted him contracts. None in the bureaucracy is ready to buy the argument that Ministers as well the top officials concerned were unaware of the orders at the highest level.

Slip-up

On the government’s part, there is no reason it did not make it doubly sure that all departments complied with the orders blacklisting Suryanarayana after it tasted defeat in the Supreme Court and the High Court in its attempt to take disciplinary action against him. While it is for the commission of inquiry to identify persons responsible for committing the scam, what is amazing is that departments like marketing, backward classes welfare, minorities welfare, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan and school education should entrust their civil work, all worth a whopping Rs. 130 crore to the Fisheries Department on nomination basis. Did they verify whether the engineering wing of the Fisheries Department (annual budget Rs. 71 crore) had the wherewithal to execute the work?

Heavy flak

Over the past four years, the government faced heavy flak on several issues like awarding contracts worth hundreds of crores through the engineering, procurement and contract (EPC) system, paying Rs. 11 crore to one Michael Schuster in the Volkswagen scam and escalating the cost estimates of the Yellampalli project by Rs. 391 crore and getting rapped by the Comptroller & Auditor General (CAG) of India.

All these shortcomings conveyed an impression that systems had been given a go-by due to the government’s extravagant ways and its reluctance to put checks and balances or a regulatory mechanism in place. In the present instance, the government ought to have followed due diligence, more so because of Suryanarayana’s track record of indulging in irregularities earlier.

It may not be enough to punish Suryanarayana since several other State actors are involved. For instance, the ‘peshis’ of some Ministers have acquired notoriety after introduction of a centralised system of pooling together all the personal assistants and private secretaries and attaching them to various Ministers.

The situation calls for a thorough cleansing of the State Secretariat.

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