IAS couple gets poorer by Rs 3 crore!

OVER 10 months after I-T sleuths recovered Rs 3.1 crore (about USD 0.7 million) in cash from 1979 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS couple, Arvind Kumar Joshi and Tinoo Joshi, police attached to the office of the MP Lokayukta raided their home once more. According to media reports, Lokayukta’s special police establishment (SPE) team that conducted the raids recovered cash worth Rs 7 lakh at the residence of the power couple located at a posh locality in Bhopal. Also, Rs 12 lakh in their salary accounts and gold ornaments of 146 grams were also reportedly found. In pure arithmetic terms, the IAS couple became poorer by about Rs 3 crore in less than one year!

Lokayukta’s office has registered a case against the suspended IAS couple.

Meanwhile, Bihar government has begun the process of converting corrupt officials’ properties and converting those in schools. In the first of such case, the home of former motor vehicle inspector (MVI) Raghuvansh Kunwar at Chaira village in Samastipur district was confiscated and according to the announcement made by Bihar HRD minister PK Sahi, the property would be converted into a school.

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Gujarat HC's direction on bureaucrats' assets

Gujarat high court has directed the Public Information Officers (PIO) to take into account of objections of the officers before passing orders about disclosure of property under the Right To Information (RTI) act. The ongoing case has huge significance whether bureaucrats including IAS, IPS and IFS will need to disclose their personal properties under the RTI Act. The Gujarat High Court has taken up the case in which RTI applicants sought annual property returns of officers. Arvind Agrawal, a 1984 batch Gujarat cadre IAS is fighting the case on behalf of bureaucrats.

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2 court cases on disclosure of bureaucrats’ assets

Richie Rich Andhra IAS arrested

YET another IAS officer has been caged by investigative authorities for amassing income disproportionate to his known sources of income. The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of Andhra Pradesh arrested a 1999 batch IAS, M Jagan Mohan, after alleged unearthing of assets worth Rs 20 crore. The 52-year old Mohan, who was promoted to IAS 11 years ago, is currently posted as joint collector of Ranga Reddy district.

According to media reports, the ACB raided his residence on Tuesday and claimed to have recovered huge assets including Rs 1.5 lakh in cash, three kg of gold and documents of properties worth in crores.

Reports quoting an ACB joint director further said that bank balance amounting to Rs 12 lakh and investments in life insurance policies, national savings and Kisan Vikas Patras amounting to Rs 15 lakh were also seized during the raid. Among other articles seized during the raid included a car valued about Rs 7 lakh.

About three months ago, the residences of a number of IAS officers were raided in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh by Income-Tax department. In the house of Arvind Kumar Joshi and Tinoo Joshi, both 1979 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS, a whopping Rs 3.1 crore in cash, jewellery and documents of properties were seized.

(In Picture: Richie Rich, the richest kid in the world, is a fictional character in comics.)

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Painting the life of an Air Force Marshal

A life-like portrait of the Marshal of the Indian Air Force Arjan Singh DFC was unveiled by Air Chief Marshal PV Naik at IAF’s Akash Officers’ Mess in New Delhi recently. The portrait of the icon was painted by noted painter Sanjay Bhattacharyya whose other portraits of former Presidents also adorn the precincts of Rashtrapati Bhavan, the Parliament House and other distinguished institutions. The Marshal who celebrated his 92nd birthday on April 15, last month was commissioned as a fighter pilot in Dec 1939. He was conferred the rank of Marshal of the Indian Air Force on Jan 26, 2002 making him the only ‘five-star’ rank officer of the IAF till date. 

Quite Revealing: Indian civil servants’ assets may come under RTI, MP turns first state to give nod

WITH Madhya Pradesh government agreeing to bring assets of bureaucrats in public domain following a recent order of Central Information Commission, the process of RTI Raj prevailing over bureaucrats’ age-old doctrine of secretary has entered the final stage. If assets of 290 IAS officers of Madhya Pradesh cadre have already been brought under the ambit of RTI, it’s not far from forcing civil servants of other cadres as well, to publicly disclose their assets just like their political masters who by law disclose their assets while filing nominations for any Indian election.

Social activist Ajay Dubey has already asked the income tax department to give information on tax returns filed by about IAS officers of Madhya Pradesh cadre during the past five years, media reports said. In fact, bureaucracy in Madhya Pradesh suffered a major set back when a recent Income-Tax raid in the residence of Arvind Kumar Joshi and Tinoo Joshi, both 1979 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS, recovered a whopping Rs 3.1 crore in cash, jewellery and documents of properties disproportionate to their known sources of income. Both the officers have subsequently been suspended, and investigations are continuing. (Read: Tinoo and Arvind Joshi’s date with Delhi’s key ministries)

Significantly, civil servants routinely file their asset disclosures, but those gather dust in official files and have not been made public so far. (Read: Officers’ submission of immovable properties). Also, I-T department does not hand over personal details of any citizens including bureaucrats. But a recent order of the Central Information Commission, pronounced by Information Commissioner Shailesh Gandhi said that disclosure of information such as assets of a public servant cannot be construed as an invasion on the privacy of an individual. The order said, “...If people who aspire to be public servants must declare their property details, it is only logical that the details of assets of those who are public servants must be considered to be disclosable”.

The prominent Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS officers now include expenditure secretary Ms Sushama Nath (1974 batch), school education secretary Ms Anshu Vaish (1975 batch), disinvestment secretary Sumit Bose (1976 batch), (Read: Profile of Sumit Bose) MP chief secretary Avani Vaish (1975 batch) (Read: Profile of Avani Vaish), special secretary in defence production Ajoy Acharya (1976 batch), central provident fund commissioner Uday Kumar Varma (who is also a special secretary in Information and Broadcasting ministry till March 31, 2010), Director of Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration (LBSNAA) Padamvir Singh (1977 batch), joint secretary in PMO R Gopalakrishnan (1979 batch) and DG Doordarshan Ms Aruna Sharma (1982 batch) among others.

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Action and Appointments

a) Chhattisgarh government on Wednesday suspended senior agriculture secretary Babulal Agrawal (Read: The IAS with 220 bank accounts) whose premises were raided by Income-Tax Department. The case was handed over to Economic Offences Wing (EOW).

b) The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved the proposal for premature repatriation of Aditi Mehta, a 1979 batch Rajasthan cadre IAS, presently working as joint secretary in the Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (ICNCA) to her parent cadre.

c) The ACC has approved the proposal of premature repatriation of DN Srivastava, a 1984 batch IFS officer and joint secretary in the ministry of overseas Indian affairs to his parent cadre.

d) Neeraj Kumar Gupta, a 1982 batch UP cadre IAS, presently joint secretary in commerce ministry has been appointed as Executive Director, India Trade Promotion Organization (ITPO).

e) V Bhaskar, a 1981 batch AP cadre IAS has been appointed as joint secretary in the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP).

f) SC Sinha, a 1975 batch Haryana cadre IPS, has been appointed as Director General of the National Investigation Agency (NIA). He is currently working as a Special Director of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

The IAS with 220 bank accounts attended 6 foreign courses in 4 years

THIS set of statistics is quite unusual, and even suspicious in an IAS officer’s CV. Babulal Agrawal, a 1988 batch Chhattishgarh cadre IAS and currently the state’s agriculture secretary, attended six short-term (one to two weeks each) foreign courses in a span of just four years between 2002 and 2006. From attending a World Bank training programme in Thailand and participating in a hospital management course in Singapore, and then attending management development programmes in Denmark and US, all in four years, Mr Agrawal remained a frequent flyer to foreign destinations.

But, as Mr Agrawal is now cornered by the Income-Tax raid revealing how he allegedly posses whopping 220 bank accounts opened in the names of his peons and maid servants, and with Rs 40 crore deposited in them, his frequent foreign junkets for attending short courses may also come under scrutiny, sources in the corridors of power said.

An MA in political science, Mr Agrawal served as collector in districts like Sehore, Rajnandgaon and Durg, and later became Managing Director of Chhattisgarh Infrastructure Development Corporation (CIDC) between October 15, 2007 and April 14, 2008.

After the suspension of IAS couple Arvind Kumar Joshi and Tinoo Joshi, both 1979 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre officers, post I-T raid, there are speculations that the axe may fall on Mr Agrawal too. 

Cash in Hand: Suspended IAS power couple Tinoo and Arvind Joshi's date with Delhi's key ministries

HE WAS in George Fernandes’ team in the defence ministry during NDA’s second innings and served as a joint secretary as the fierce Kargil war was fought during the summer of 1999. And his wife served as the secretary general of Federation of Indian Export Organisation (FIEO) when Kamal Nath was the commerce minister during UPA’s first innings.

But this power couple, Arvind Kumar Joshi and Tinoo Joshi, both 1979 batch Madhya Pradesh cadre IAS, are left with nothing in their defence now, after an Income-Tax raid in their residence on Thursday recovered a whopping Rs 3.1 crore in cash, jewellery and documents of properties disproportionate to their known sources of income. On Friday, Madhya Pradesh government suspended both of them with immediate effect.

The other serving IAS whose residence at Raipur was also raided by the tax sleuths was Chhattisgarh’s agriculture secretary and 1988 batch Chhattisgarh cadre IAS Babulal Agrawal. The I-T team recovered Rs 52 lakh from his residence and jewellery worth Rs 72 lakh. According to media reports, what was recovered from Joshis’ residence included cash of Rs. 3.1 crore, foreign exchange worth Rs 7 lakh, jewellery worth Rs 66 lakh, and investments worth Rs 3 crore. Their five bank lockers were already sealed.

Like most other IAS couples, Tinoo, a Bengali met her fellow IAS Arvind in the academy and later got married. A post graduate in chemistry, Tinoo Joshi later took an MBA degree from an Australian university just like husband who too is an MBA from the University of Wollongong.

Even in late 1980s and early 1990s, the Joshi couple held some important posts in Central deputation as deputy secretaries. Where as Tinoo Joshi served as deputy secretary in PMO (July 1, 1988 to January 1, 1990) and ministry of labour (January 1, 1990 to July 1, 1992), Arvind Joshi served as deputy secretary in health July 1, 1988 to September 1, 1989), director in the ministry of railways (September 1, 1989 to April 1, 1991) and deputy secretary in the ministry of coal (April 1, 1991 to August 1, 1992).

Finally, who are the prominent batch mates of Tinoo and Arvind Joshi? They include R Gopalakrishnan (Madhya Pradesh cadre), joint secretary in PMO, Vinay Sheel Oberoi (Assam cadre), Permanent Representative in UNESCO, Paris, Dr Prasanna Kumar Mohanty (Orissa cadre) and Mission Director, Jawaharlal Nehru Nl Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) under the ministry of housing and urban poverty alleviation, and Ms Zohra Chatterji (UP cadre), joint secretary information and broadcasting ministry. 

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