Chauhan government allots 200 acres to Sangh Parivar

As it nears the end of its five-year term, the BJP government of Madhya Pradesh has decided to allot precious land to the Sangh Parivar organisations at nominal prices. It has made 67 allotments measuring over 200 acres of land at Indore, Bhopal, Jabalpur, Khandwa, Balaghat, Pipariya, Shyopur, Sagar and other places, valued at Rs 500-600 crore.

The Lokayukta Organisation registered a case on September 25 on a complaint of PCC spokesman KK Mishra.

Mishra says in his petition to the Lokayukta that the beneficiaries include the RSS, BJP, Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), Saraswati Shishu Mandir, the Parivar-run Bal Kalyan Samitis, and the construction companies and housing societies controlled by the BJP leaders. Mishra has annexed copies of all the allotment orders and sought cancellations of the allotments and stringent action against those responsible for misusing their office and position.

The government allotted 5,000 sq ft of land at Raisen to Kushwah Samaj at zero premium and only Re 1 annual lease rent on August 22. Similarly, the land measuring 0.819 hectares was allotted to Saraswati Shishu Mandir at Malhargarh (Mandsaur district) at 50 per cent of the minimum price and 2 per cent of the premium as annual lease rent on permanent lease. These instances are illustrative. Most of the allotments are on permanent lease.

The BJP leaders’ love for land is not a new phenomenon. The government of Sunderlal Patwa (1990-92) had also made allotments to the Parivar-related organisations. One of the first tasks of Digvijay Singh on becoming the head of the Congress government in December 1993 was to constitute a one-man committee to go into the land allotments made in urban areas by the BJP government between March 1990 and December 1992.  It was headed by retired chief secretary Jagatpati.

The Jagatpati committee submitted 37 reports during its six-year term. Five of these reports related to the Chhattisgarh region and were sent there for action. The committee did a commendable job by pinpointing where and how the law/rules were violated in making the allotments. Digvijay Singh, however, never proceeded against those responsible for violation of the law. Instead, he regularised the allotments in which Patwa’s family members were personally involved or interested and cancelled some of the allotments. For the rest, he would keep the reports of the Jagatpati inquiry committee on his table in the Assembly and flaunt it when the opposition BJP tried to raise some cantankerous issue.

What KK Mishra expects from the Lokayukta by making one more complaint of corruption against the government of Shivraj Singh Chauhan is not really clear. In fact, the high-ups in the Lokayukta Organisation have allegedly entered into ‘deals’ with those against whom there are corruption charges to keep the complaints under wraps. The allegation against the Organisation is wild and could have been the fabrication of some idle mind. However, what keeps it in circulation is the failure of the Organisation to investigate even a single case of corruption against ministers and high-profile bureaucrats in the past five years.

Most of the complaints against the ministers have been made by the Congress leaders. For this, they collect the documents to substantiate their complaints and approach the Lokayukta Organisation, the only authority provided by the law to deal with corruption allegations against public servants. Weary of the Lokayukta’s indifference to her complaint of corruption against chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan and his wife Sadhna Singh, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Jamuna Devi went to the Supreme Court but was advised to first exhaust the other avenues available to her. Then a Congress leader approached the special court in Bhopal with an identical complaint and the court directed the Lokayukta Organisation in mid-November last year to investigate it. It is stuck there.

The Congress leaders find themselves trapped in a vicious circle. They want to expose the misdeeds of the BJP ministers. If they don’t, they are liable to be accused of conniving with the corrupt ministers. When they do, the Lokayukta Organisation officials sit over the complaints (and probably strike deals with the accused). However, the Congress leaders tend to think the latter is still the better course if and when they can lay their hands on another corrupt activity of the ruling party.

Ruckus at cabinet meeting

Meanwhile, a ruckus was created at the cabinet meeting by minister of food and civil supplies Akhand Pratap Singh by objecting to the manner in which the government had decided to allot 15 hectares of land near Ramnagar village in the chief minister’s Budhni Assembly constituency to an organisation floated by RSS leader and state BJP vice-president Anil Dave who is enjoying enormous powers without any responsibility under the present BJP dispensation, the entire Chauhan government virtually dancing to his tunes.

The minister pointed out that it was the pastureland belonging to the poor people of Ramnagar village and its conversion into the land for constructing houses was not permitted by the law. He also alleged that the wrong khasra number of the land was deliberately given in the newspaper advertisements inviting objections to the allotment of the land which amounted to committing a fraud on the poor people.

Gauri Shankar Shejwar, who had walked away to join Uma Bharati but later returned to the BJP to become minister of energy, was joined by some other ministers to shout down Akhand Pratap Singh. However, minister of commercial taxes Babulal Gaur, who is also a former chief minister, observed that as the matter concerned the chief minister’s constituency, it would be prudent to ensure that the laws and rules were not violated in making the allotment. He was supported by minister of commerce and industries Jayant Malaiya.

Akhand Pratap Singh walked out of the cabinet meeting, saying that he did not want to become a party to the move to deprive the poor people of their land illegally. His harangue, though, seemed to have depressed the enthusiasm of Chauhan and others in the cabinet which decided to reduce from 15 hectares to only four hectares of land to be allotted to Anil Dave’s Narmada Samagra Nyas. Besides, the cabinet also decided not to make the allotment immediately but to reserve it in the name of the Nyas.

Adding a new dimension to the state’s ‘corruption game’, Akhand Pratap Singh had earlier declared his determination to fight corruption in his own department. Singh is himself facing corruption charges on several counts. The complaint against him was also made to the Lokayukta by Congress leader KK Mishra.

Singh went to the Lokayukta office and had parleys with the secretary (Lokayukta Ripusudan Dayal being on leave) and with Up-Lokayukta Chandresh Bhushan. Later on he told media persons that he had gone to request an expeditious inquiry into the charges against him and also to discuss how he could proceed against the officers and employees indulging in corruption in his department. He said that corruption was rampant in several schemes run by his department, like Annapoorna Yojana and PDS.

The charges against Singh include restoring a petrol pump in Bhopal to an owner who was found guilty of adulteration in diesel and petrol and his licence was cancelled after following the due process of law; restoring the licence of an oil agency in Rajgarh which was found repeatedly guilty of irregularities; and taking money from a BJP activist of Tikamgarh district by promising a job to his son.

This mercurial Yadav from Bundelkhand region was earlier in the Congress and as minister of state for animal husbandry (independent charge) in the Digvijay Singh government, he had discovered rampant corruption in his department. He identified some senior officials who were said to be patronising the corruption and wrote to the chief minister to take action against them. Digvijay Singh, instead, dropped Akhand Pratap Singh from his council of ministers.

As the food and civil supplies minister in the Chauhan government, he had antagonised some ruling party members by ordering action against PDS shops run by the BJP activists or supporters for alleged malpractices.