Meeting with Lokayukta Justice Hegde

Hi All,

Our meeting began at about 13.00 with Mr.Riaz. We went into Justice Santosh Hegde's chambers at about 13.30 & the meeting ended at almost 15.15 hrs - quite long, detailed & very useful.

Justice Santosh Hegde was most welcoming & shared a lot of his ideas & narrated the many constraints that his office worked under. He also cited various examples, similar to the types that we get to hear everywhere.

The general impression we gathered were as follows :   Ministers are above the ambit of the LokAyukta. Top bureaucrats, though questionable, usually remained protected & are unassailable. Lower rungs of the bureaucracy are more vulnerable, & so, their targets usually lie here. However, even after exposure, they slither away as government does not usually take stringent action against them.

Suo Moto* powers were repeatedly being denied to LokAyukta by the government, & this was a big handicap for their work.

As Praveen mentioned, Justice Hegde had insisted that all IAS /IPS officers declare their assets, but this could not be enforced legally, & had resulted in only 3 of them coming forward to do so.

The "Whistleblower" law is still pending, as governments have still to move forward. Thus, there is no progress on this front.

Devesh had a suggestion to prepare & post FAQs on praja with help from LokAyukta's office for various hurdles that we face day to day, such as if someone were to apply for building license, but the same was not being passed, what options, including legal ones that he could take; Or if one were to encounter problems with say, public health centers demanding excess money, what recourse one could take, etc..

All in all, it was a great meeting. We remain better enlightened about their system & how it works. This had been explained with several examples for our better understanding.

(*Suo Moto is a legal Latin term, or more appropriately, "Sua Sponte", means "on its own motion". It is used, for example, where a government agency acts on its own cognizance, as in "the Commission took Suo Moto control over the matter").

Some points that others have missed out:

Lok Ayukta has a huge police force woking under him to carry-out the investigation work. The number is well over 100, with the highest rank being a DIG, if I got it right. They are posted here on deputation from the regular force. So, he has first to do a 'detoxification' (my usage) exercise with them before assigning them their duties.

At the highest levels, he selects from a panel of names forwarded by the government. And, if he is not satisfied with the panel, he asks for a fresh panel. He even named an officer who he had rejected recently, and, in my view, justifiably so. I happen to know the officer.

Further, the first thing he did on assuming office is to declare his wealth, including on the net. Inspite of having served as a Supreme Court judge, he does not have a plot of land in Bangalore, or anywhere in the country, nor any agricultural holdings or anything like that. All that he has is the flat where he lives. He says he is comfortable, and that's all that he wants.

If the system can throw up people like him, there's hope after all, I would like to conclude.

Muralidhar Rao

Guys,

I must thank you all for the efforts that are being put in meeting with various officials in different departments. I am impressed with our Lok Ayukta Mr. Hegde. I admire his integrity and honesty. This shows that honesty and integrity requires much more sacrifices than we envision.

Guys, after reading post on every meetings and its minutes, I am feeling very emotional that I am missing something more precious for being not been in Bangaloreable to participate.Keep up the good work.

Admin, time has come to go full throttle on creating and publishing Gyan pages for other folks to take advantage of. We should create enough basic information about all the civic authorities and govt departments that can guide people in filing PILs, RTIs, complaints, giving tips to Loka Ayukta, Tax departments etc. Before I ask others let me put the basic info on filing RTIs this weekend. I do hope others would also lend their support in this.

Syed

The two big thoughts that ran through my head as I left Justice Hegde's office after the meeting were:

1. These guys must be frustrated on two counts. A) Not many citizens come forward and complain. Sample this, the 24/7 Loayukta helpline gets a paltry 40 calls a day. Thats it. B) In most cases, after having caught a bribe taker via a trap, or having unearthed unaccounted property via raids, they have to live with the govt officer getting away with a transfer or light suspension or in many cases nothing much if LA office doesn't get government's sanction to prosecute
2. Why is it that not many NGO types are engaged with Lokayukta? My first question to Justice Hegde was - "do citizen bodies work with you ...", and he said only one has worked in recent past, and there too, they promised to help with something and then perhaps lost interest. I thought that this (LA) is one place where we really can do things to help.

But then, some words of caution on both above points.

• Despite their frustrations, they are a very very enthusiastic bunch, all three individuals we met came across as very driven guys no matter what!
• About helping Lokayukta, we got to be careful as perhaps there would be an element of risk involved.

Some recent cases they narrated to us, esp the one that Mr Riaz told us (recall the recent news about a BDA engineer getting caught taking bribe, and the bribe taker too was arrested) left me stunned. Not that we don't hear or or see this stuff  in gossip circles and movies, but thinking that Lokayukta office has to live with watching people get away is shocking.

To the laymen, let me explain what I understood of the problem around this jargon called suo motu powers. Lets say Lokayukta has solid evidence against a corrupt babu. He can't go after that babu till some person or organization files a formal complaint . Further, there is no provision to provide anonymity to the complainant. So, in a nutshell, a bunch of people can't just drop a CD in his office, walk away, and then expect LA's office to do something. In fact, he had a CD sitting on his table with detailed evidence of irregularities at a big name builder's project, but he said that he can't do a thing unless someone come forwards as a complainant.

For the sake of a balanced discussion, one must understand that there probably are some arguments against giving such powers powers to LA as well. LA's office could be misused, say by the government themselves to selectively make him go after the individuals they dislike. When his office would get flooded with 1000 calls a day, who will dictate which one he should go after first? Next, you are taking a chance with Lokayukta as a person as well, what if the next person after Justice Hegde turns out to be a corrupt man himself? Pay Lokayokta some money, and get your enemy behind the bars - would that be a possibility?

I vaguely asked a question on these lines to Justice Hegde, and he said that there is a "check" on his office as well. Judiciary has the rights to investigate his actions. I assume this means that if the aggrieved party feels being victimized, they could approach courts to get Lokayukta's actions in that particular case investigated.

If such a check is in place, whats the problem with suo motu powers? As long as his office pursues all cases with powerful and documented evidences, whats our problem who he goes after and who he does not? If he could work transparently based on just evidences, imagine how much help he could get from general public in collecting evidences and building his cases against corrupt officials.

We talked and heard so much. Tough to type it all.

We should ask Mr Hegde if he can work along with IT deptt, those folks could be the "complainants", and that way he can work on even "anonymous" tips.

Important point that. They already behave like modern-day kings. We reinforce this behaviour by treating them as gods.

Dear admin, can you please post the contact details of the lokayukta here.
They are supposed to have a call in number, websites etc.
At least readers can get intouch with them
-- PhotoYogi

So now, how many people will be game for a simple project

• Every month, write one or two RTI applications to Lokayukta office
• Post the replies on the website

We will figure the exct details of what to ask (will have to be creative so that we get clear updates on what action LA has taken, and where all he faced hurdles from the government) once a few folks come forward.

RTI to LA office would be a simple, easy and practical way to collaborate with them.