| Published on 07-01-2009 In General |
| Viewed 1272 times | Written by N.D.Sharma |
| Now is the time for Chauhan to mend ways of his official |
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Shivraj Singh Chauhan is face to face with the malignant growth in his government. He has an opportunity to act the ruthless surgeon --- and thus change his image from that of a flamboyant demagogue to an administrator.
The opportunity has been provided by the extermination of a young and youthful life by the corrupt and the inefficient in his administration. Bapulal alias Bablu (aged about 24 years) swallowed some poisonous stuff on his umpteenth visit to the Huzur tehsil office to get the land title changed. He died on the way to hospital.
Bablu's father Hari Singh Meena of Khejdadev village wanted a change in land titles and had been making trips for years to the Huzur tehsil office (situated in the Revenue Commissioner's office complex in Bhopal). Bablu had been accompanying his father till he got disgusted with the apathetic attitude of the babus at the tehsil office and took the extraordinary step of ending his life in front of them.
A suicide note left behind by Bablu says that they had even paid a bribe of Rs 10,000 to the patwari for what should be considered a routine work; still, the patwari did not do their work but went on making new demands. On the fateful day, Bablu had come to appear in the court of tehsildar L.K.Khare. As the hearing was adjourned to another date, he consumed poison which he had apparently brought with him.
This happened a few days after minister of state for revenue (independent charge) Karan Singh Verma had issued the "firman" that all the pending revenue cases should be settled within 60 days.
As the suicide took place in Bhopal, it was noted by the media widely. The farmers of Khejdadev and the neighbouring villages held protest demonstrations in Bhopal. Chauhan, always showing concern for the plight of the farmers, went to Hari Singh's Khejdadev village to console the family. The villagers there confirmed what Bablu had written in his suicide note about how the tehsil office staff had been harassing the father-sun duo. The chief minister ordered immediate transfer of Bhopal Collector Manish Rastogi and Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM) of Huzur Sanjay Kumar Singh. Earlier, tehsildar L.K.Khare and patwari Madanlal Sahu were placed under suspension. A magisterial inquiry was ordered. The chief minister handed over to the bereaved family a cheque for Rs two lakh as compensation.
A couple of days after Bablu's suicide, another farmer announced that he, too, had been feeling like committing suicide because of the harassment meted out to him by the revenue officials. Hanumant Singh of Chandukhedi village of the same Huzur tehsil said in a statement to the press that he had been making trips to the tehsil office for over two years for the change of land title and had even met the Collector. Whenever he complained to the senior officers about his plight, they threatened to get him arrested, Hanumant Singh claimed. He added that he had become so desperate that he had been contemplating suicide.
The steps taken by the chief minister are merely palliatives and do not cure the disease which has taken deep roots. Manish Rastogi, who has been removed as the Collector of Bhopal, has been posted as the additional secretary, finance, in the State secretariat. Sanjay Kumar Singh, who was the SDM of Huzur, has been made Joint Collector of Balaghat district. Is it a punishment to the two IAS officers whose culpability in the Bablu suicide incident has been obviously admitted by the chief minister?
This indulgent attitude of the chief minister is not in conformity with the anguish which he reportedly expressed in front of the family members of Bablu at Khejdadev village. He was reported to have shouted at Bhopal Division Commissioner Pukhraj Maroo: "this all happened in your office complex; you are also responsible for this". Maroo, revenue minister Karan Singh Verma and some other officials had accompanied the chief minister during his visit to the bereaved family.
The patwari, who was accused of having taken Rs.Ten thousand in bribe and still having not done the work, has been arrested and put behind the bars. If the farmers continue to build up pressure, he may even be prosecuted and sentenced to jail term. But that is not going to make life for the farmers easy. Patwaris everywhere, no doubt, play the villain in the revenue matters but they form only a small part in the vicious circle. The real culprits are the tehsildars and the Collectors --- and the SDMs between the two. The Collector is essentially in charge of the revenue matters in the district and he is bestowed with quasi-judicial powers to settle the revenue disputes. He is supposed to hold regular courts to hear the revenue matters and redress the people's grievances. The tehsildar has similarly supervisory powers over the patwaris under him.
The revenue officers, though, have their own grievances. Their grouse is that they are burdened so much with the work other than that relating to their department that they hardly find time to attend to their primary duties. Their association had in fact submitted to the government a memorandum in this regard about four years ago and a committee of five principal secretaries, headed by the principal secretary to revenue department, was constituted to go into their problems and suggest the remedy. The committee was asked to submit its report by July 2005 but that report has not been submitted so far, according to association president Roopesh Upadhyaya. Their grievances apart, the revenue officers have the tendency to treat the poor villagers as if they belong to some sub-human species ---- and this is not only in Madhya Pradesh.
It is the time for Chauhan to shed the IAS-phobia and take stern and urgent steps to fix accountability. He has behind him tremendous goodwill of the people who have mandated him and his party for the second term, overlooking the omissions and commissions of his first term. |
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