Vigilance Awareness mechanical: PIDPI Campaign kindles hope through Awareness by CCI
Dr.Badal Tah,Odishabarta
Rayagada, November 5: Vigilance awareness has become really a mechanical process when the top sleuths in bureaucracy bungle with huge corruption. Same officers with the same face. A few examples of mammoth financial irregularities can be cited. The Ex-ADM of Rayagada Dharmananda Behera, presently officiating as PD-DRDA Bargarh, illegally occupied a suite for 407 days in the circuit house for which lakhs of rupees were recovered from him after the Collector’s order.
Unfortunately, the same officer was seen taking oath during vigilance awareness week in 2022 not to indulge in corruption in the presence of the Collector, MLA and all the district-level officials. Ex-DFO Rayagada Bijaya Kumar Parida, presently under suspension for amassing crores of money, also administered an oath to his subordinate staff to stay away from corruption. In yet another case Asst Registrar of Cooperative Societies, Gunupur Circle suspended Jitendra Nishal, MD of Chandrapur LAMPCS for graft charges amounting Rs10,38,111.00; but he is yet to handover charges and arrested.
Three tainted officers named Pradeep Kumar Mohanty, Executive Engineer, Muduli Venkta Ramana, Asst. Executive Engineer, Rajendra Kumar Mandal, J.E., all belonging to Rural Works Division, Rayagada, got suspended because of the death of five tribals including four children in K Singhpur Block as a weakly constructed bridge caved in. Members of the Society for Fast Justice, Rayagada have filed case in Rayagada Court under section 1cc for their arrest and recovery of compensation amounting Rs.20 lakhs paid by Govt to the kin of the deceased.
In another case, Rasmi Ranjan Dora, a social worker, has approached Lokayukta Odisha for massive corruption in MGNREGA in Chandrapur Block where Ex-BDO George Dungdung is involved in irregularities of more than Rs.46 lakhs including a cash transaction of Rs.16 lakhs. Rasmi filed the case before Lokayukta as no action was taken by concerned authorities in spite of Ombudman’s report and news about the corruption in several newspapers.
.“All these incidents of bungling are of this year only. These cases have cropped in several mass media. Still then the culprits are scot-free and least action is taken against them. It is like the fence eats up the crop. Though these few cases are exposed and surfaced, this is only tip of the iceberg. It is really unfortunate that the senior govt officers, who are administering oaths to their subordinates, are involved in corruption.
Abstaining from corruption will be a day dream till casual and lackadaisical attitude of the top-notch department officers does not change”, said Rabindra Patakhandal, Convenor of Odisha Suchana Adhikar Manch, Rayagada.Still, there is hope & optimism.
An outreach activity and Public Interest Disclosure and Protection of Informer(PIDPI) Campaign program was conducted by the Cotton Corporation of India(CCI) Ltd branch office Rayagada in Government UG High School, Bairagihalwa- Rayagada. Various competitions were organised among the students followed by pledge-taking activities. Shri Tamajit Kumar Das, branch manager CCI attended as chief guest along with head master of the school Shri Binod Mohanty. Das addressed the gathering on anti-corruption issues. In continuation to the above, two farmer’s awareness camps were held at RMC- Gunupur & Rayagada on the occasion of vigilance awareness week. The RMC secretaries and CCI centre in charge Mitta Dasu, Om Prakash Baghel and Priti Ranjan Parida addressed on the topic PIDPI, the Adhar-based payment system to farmers and MSP operation of cotton. All the above programs were coordinated by Sunil Patra, state head (vigilance), the CCI, Ministry of Textile, Govt of India.
