MONDAY, JUNE 17, 2024
It will not obviously be advertised and publicised. But it is known clearly to many Goans as well as to many from outside that this beautiful land of ours is one of the most corrupt in this country.
Corruption has become a way of life. It’s a religion
From buying jobs and positions, including entry into the police service or for prime postings, there is money to be paid for everything. From registration to licences to NOCs, from the panchayat to the municipality and government departments, people say that files do not move unless “grease” is applied to them with bank notes.
The most serious statement on corruption against any State in the country, ever by a Constitutional authority, was made about Goa. The BJP government brushed it off
If any confirmation and endorsement of this was needed, it came from the words of a former Goa and current Meghalaya Governor Satya Pal Malik who said on camera clearly, “There was corruption in everything the Goa government did.”
This was perhaps the most direct and damming statement on corruption made against any government in the history of India by a serving Constitutional authority. Would the BJP have kept quiet if this kind of comment was made on a State government under the rule of any other political party? But what did it do in Goa? It got its State president and other functionaries to simply say that the Governor should have resigned before making such charges. There was not a word on the specific and pointed charges made by the governor.
They were and let us say this before this is buried totally
- The Goa government’s plan of door-to-door distribution of ration during COVID times was done on the insistence of a company that paid money to the government.
- There is an area near the airport from where mining trucks were allowed to pass. Governor Malik asked the government to stop them in view of COVID. The government didn’t and then it became a hotspot for COVID.
The specific charges were not even acknowledged.
Let Goans decide if Parrikar’s promise on Day 1 that there would be zero tolerance to corruption has been fulfilled
On the day Manohar Parrikar was sworn in as Chief Minister in 2012, his first comment from the very stage was: “There will be zero tolerance to corruption”. From that day till now, in a ten-year period, no other party has governed Goa. At the end of its second consecutive term in power, a former Governor has said There was “corruption in everything. I was removed for my allegation of corruption against the Goa government”. It doesn’t need rocket science to figure out the promise of zero tolerance to corruption was fulfilled.
Goans know how the Institution of the Lokayukta has been weakened and made toothless by this government
The previous Lokayukta of Goa Prafulla Kumar Misra finished his tenure as a very unhappy man. The custodian of an institution formed to check corruption in governance and by government servants realised that there was no will act on his recommendations. He went to the extent of stating that the Goa Lokayukta Act was weakened compared to Karnataka, to protect the corrupt. In an interview to The Indian Express, he spoke of urgent interventions in giving “teeth to the institution of Lokayukta” and of his disenchantment, “as the State government has till date has not executed a single Lokayukta report”.
In Karnataka and Kerala, under Section 17, of the Lokayukta Act, the power to prosecute lies with the Lokayukta. In Goa, that power is taken away. So, the Lokayukta can go on recommending prosecution against whom they find corrupt but it is up to the State government to act.
Mining Corruption: Why is there no action on clear acts of corruption of mining officials during the renewal of leases?
The Lokayukta, commenting on the illegal renewal of 88 leases of which 31 were done on the same day (which the Supreme Court had struck down) told Indian Express: “The same day 31 leases were renewed without bothering to find out if those mine owners had violated any conditions of the lease, or any findings of the Shah Commission report.”
He added, “I questioned the government official’s efficiency on that single day and their motive: if it is not to help the leaseholders what else was the motive? I have also stated that it’s difficult to prove any money was taken, but there is a clear abuse of the official position, which is an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act.”
There is corruption, corruption everywhere
Crores have been spent on a beach cleaning contract. But look at the state of our beaches. There are in an absolute mess and if there is a festival or a long weekend, the North Goa beaches look like urban slums.
The tender scam is ongoing. Tenders are cornered by one or two main parties, hand in glove with the government for almost all projects. Sources in the government say, at times work orders are first issued and the tender is made public later.
The cost of the flyover goes by 200 per cent from the amount approved. Interestingly electricity poles, where the maximum kickbacks are suspected come up much before the bridge construction is ready.
Take Panjim’s Smart City project. Many “smart people” and politicians and officials have surely secured their future for generations ahead. Their “smart” choices have, however, left Panjim poorer, with infrastructure creaking and signs of shoddy and substandard work is visible, though payment with hundreds of crores has been made for such work.
This must change. And only a clean political force backed by people, who want to clean the system can bring about this change.
This can happen only if there is political will and people’s will. A system that literally runs on bribes will need time to reboot. And this can happen only if people make corruption one of the biggest negatives of Goa.
The stigma of corruption must be removed. And only you can do it.
