Agenda-less 100 days for Shibu Soren government- 8 April-2010

Agenda-less 100 days for Shibu Soren government

April 8th, 2010 - 3:11 pm ICT by IANS -

By Nityanand Shukla
Ranchi, April 8 (IANS) The Shibhu Soren government completed 100 days in office Thursday, but the promised 100-day agenda was never announced. Questions are being raised about the government’s resolve on a crackdown on corruption.

The government is backed by the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) and All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU).

Corruption was the main issue of the BJP during the assembly elections held last year. Then BJP president Rajnath Singh, while campaigning in the election, said: “The looted money will be extracted from the abdomens of the corrupt people.”

His statement seems to have remained only a statement.

The Soren government appointed tainted Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer A.K. Singh as chief secretary of Jharkhand April 2.

Singh had surrendered in a Bihar court after the vigilance department issued arrest warrants against him in 2003 in a graft case. He was suspended and later reinstated after he was out on bail.

Two IAS officers, Arun Kumar Singh and Sukhdeo Singh, against whom Public Interest Litigations (PILs) were filed in March, hold the key positions of urban development secretary and principal secretary of the chief minister respectively.

The charges against Arun Kumar Singh were that he misused his position to increase the budget of the tourism department and spent the money without following the government rules. He also allegedly awarded works of millions of rupees without inviting tenders.

“Sukhdeo Singh was principal secretary of (former chief minister) Madhu Koda and a Rs.4,000 crore scam took place during that time. Each file is routed through the principal secretary. Why has no agency interrogated him,” Rajiv Kumar, lawyer of the PIL petitioner, Sunil Oraon, told IANS.

“The PIL seeks direction from court that Singh be interrogated by the investigating agencies,” he said.

The government is also yet to take action on the officials whose houses were raided by the Income Tax (IT) department in February this year. Valuable documents of investments and assets were seized.

The raids were conducted on the houses of several senior officials, including Jharkhand Mines and Geology director B.B. Singh, Jharkhand State Electricity Board (JSEB) chief engineer P.K. Singh, member of state pollution board R.K. Sinha and member of electricity board S.N. Chaudhary.

The government said in an affidavit to the Jharkhand High Court in January that there was no need to hand over the Koda scam to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Shailesh Singh, state Congress general secretary said: “The Soren government is shielding corrupt people and promoting corruption in the state. Corruption is no longer an issue for the government and the BJP has been exposed as it is interested in running the government instead of fighting corruption.”

However, Jharkhand Deputy Chief Minister and state BJP president, Raghubar Das, said: “The state is not shielding anyone. Law will prevail. The present government has ordered vigilance probe into many cases in which we suspected corruption.”