Behind the scene saga of tax hounds targeting IAS officers’ premises

IF THE recent spurt of income tax raids at the premises of all powerful IAS officers of the country is any indication, there is an underlying message – the high and mighty of Indian administration too have to pay a price for amassing wealth disproportionate to their known sources of income. But who has taken this key decision of intruding into IAS officers’ citadel?

Does it mean that politicians of the ruling party have suddenly woken up to the fact that some of its top administrators, read Arvind or Tinoo Joshi, or Babulal Agrawal, have amasses huge cash-in-hand giving complexity to the country’s most corrupt politicians? Or else, does it mean IAS officers had all along been clean, and their resorting to corruption is a relatively new phenomenon?

Both these arguments are absurd, and rather ridiculous. But why then IAS or retired IAS officers (read former mining secretary of Jharkhand, Jaishankar Tiwari) are being repeatedly targeted by tax sleuths only now? If sources close to the development are correct, I-T officials (IRS officers) who are numbered over 4000 have been silently waging a war to end supremacy of IAS in the department, and in the process have shown their strength by targeting the vulnerable lot among the powerful IAS.

In fact, unlike in the railways or postal departments where IAS officers don’t dictate terms, the IRS officers ultimately come under the revenue secretary of the ministry of finance, and the top IRS officer, or the chairman of Central Board of Direct Taxes, holds the rank of a special secretary – one notch below the full-fledged secretary. In other words, the current CBDT chairman, for example, is two batches senior to revenue secretary Sunil Mitra, a 1975 batch IAS, but in the rank he is junior to Mr Mitra.

Significantly, the relations between top taxmen of the country and former revenue secretary PV Bhide, a 1972 batch AP cadre IAS, reached all time low, particularly after the direct tax code was unveiled without consulting the CBDT board members. As the Code proposed to curtail the power of the taxmen by making them a mere a tax collecting entity, all IRS officers fought the battle in unity, and virtually paralyzed the idea originally mooted by former finance minister P Chidambaram and a handful of his key officers. But current finance minister Pranab Mukherjee agreed to the taxmen’s concerns, and the Code is unlikely to get featured in the forthcoming General Budget.

It now remains to be seen whether the country’s top taxmen succeed in converting CBDT into a full-fledged department in line with Indian Railways or India Post, but their recent targets in IAS officers’ premises have sent jitters through powerful administrators across the country who otherwise find their premises almost impregnable from all quarters including the tax hounds!

Also Read

The IAS with 220 bank accounts

Suspended IAS power couple Arvind and Tinoo Joshis' date with Delhi's ministries

Action and Appointments

a) Prabeer Kumar Basu, a 1976 batch Bihar cadre IAS has been appointed as secretary in the department of agriculture and cooperation in place of T Nanda Kumar, a 1972 batch Jharkhand cadre IAS who is retiring on February 28, 2010.

b) The appointments committee of the cabinet (ACC) has approved that SK Singh, A 1984 batch IPS may be relieved with effect from the receipt of orders.

c) The extension of tenure of Rajive Kumar, a 1981 batch UP cadre IAS and joint secretary in Cabinet Secretariat has been approved for a period of one year with effect from March 13, 2010.

Young at 65! Planning Commission’s definition of “young professionals”

Sounds funny, but the Planning Commission has been looking for filling up the post of Young Professionals with the maximum age of 65 years! Read YESTERDAY'S POST on jobcorridor.com

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.

Also Read: 

Govt should create RTI implementation cell 

RTI Raj: Prez' advice to bureaucrats

Disclosure of file notings under RTI

Challenge of disclosure of assets

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.