Dilli Ka Babu: Who’s watching?

Who will watch the watchmen? With two former chiefs of the CBI under the scanner in an unprecedented move, on alleged corruption charges, the question is being asked rather keenly. Now the CBI has also arrested a former joint director of Enforcement Directorate J.P. Singh and three other officials in connection with a corruption case. Mr Singh has been accused of accepting a bribe while investigating the Indian Premier League betting scandal as well as a Rs 5,000 crores money laundering case against an alleged hawala operator Afroz Fatta.

A 2000-batch IRS officer of customs and excise cadre, Mr Singh was suspended from ED and repatriated to his cadre after the CBI registered a case against him in September 2015. Mr Singh was arrested along with his then deputy in ED Sanjay Kumar, Mumbai-based middleman Bimal Agrawal and Gujarat-based bookie Chandresh Patel. Apparently, an internal probe ordered by current ED chief Karnal Singh had revealed that Mr Singh and Mr Kumar were indulging in corrupt practices.

Mr Singh however has accused cricket bookies of conspiring against him and implicating him in a bribery case. The law will now take its own course but senior officials being accused of deeds they are meant to prevent raises a question mark on the “watchmen” and what they “watch”.

Babus’ revolt
The arrest of Bihar Staff Selection Commission (BSSC) chairman Sudhir Kumar for the BSSC paper leak has set IAS officers on the warpath, a situation chief minister Nitish Kumar may not have foreseen. The incident has also exposed the innate rivalry between the IAS and IPS services in the state.

Sources say that Mr Sudhir’s arrest by a Special Investigation Team has got the IAS Officers’ Association riled. The association has vowed to fight the move “tooth and nail” and called Mr Sudhir as “the most honest, sincere and competent officer”.

The association secretary Vivek Kumar Singh and treasurer Dipak Kumar Singh have said the IAS officers will refuse to take “all further verbal instructions from any higher office, including the office of the honourable chief minister”. Further, no member would accept the posts of BSSC chairman, controller of examination of the Bihar Combined Entrance Competitive (BCEC) examination, or chairman of the technical services recruitment board.

The association resolved that its members would wear black badges as a mark of protest and their agitation would continue till their demands were met. But the anger is also directed at the police, since the association is now demanding that the case be transferred to the CBI in the “interest of a free and independent inquiry”.

Sources say this is the strongest “revolt” by the babus against the political leadership in recent years.

New innings
Having now taken over as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, Ajay Tyagi may be unhappy that his tenure was curtailed by two years. The senior IAS officer will head the regulator for three years instead of the regular five years (or more, as in the case of his immediate predecessor U.K. Sinha). On its part, the Centre has not offered any explanation, even more reason to get tongues wagging in babu circles.

In choosing Mr Tyagi, a 1984-batch officer of Himachal Pradesh cadre, the Centre set aside the claims of several senior bureaucrats, including power secretary P.K. Pujari. Also, Mr Tyagi had to be repatriated to his parent cadre to help him avail promotion, barely a week before he took up his current assignment at Sebi. Sources say that he still may not be able to get the chief secretary scale.

But that’s in the past. Now all eyes will be on Mr Tyagi and his stint at Sebi. The official, known to keep a low profile, has taken charge at a time when Sebi is working on strengthening the integrity of capital markets and protecting investors.