Whistleblower accuses Health Minister Nadda of 'protecting the corrupt'

Whistleblower Sanjeev Chaturvedi who has been engaged in a confrontation with the Narendra Modi government has moved the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) against the Home Ministry and the AIIMS orders which allegedly want to nullify or re-write his Annual Performance Appraisal Report, according to a report in The Wire. Chaturvedi claims he has 'already attained finality with outstanding grade' for the said period.

Chaturvedi has said that the order was in “blatant violation” of the All India Services (Performance Appraisal Report) Rules, 2007. According to the rules, it is compulsory to write more than one Annual Performance Appraisal Report if there is more than one reporting authority supervising the performance of an officer for more than 90 days. The IFS officer has claimed that the Health Ministry and AIIMS had directed him “to submit only one self appraisal report for the entire financial year (2014-15), disregarding the fact that … there was more than one reporting authority for the applicant.”

In his submission before the CAT, Chatuvedi has also questioned Health Minister JP Nadda's role in protecting corrupt officers. He said that the Nadda ministry never issued him the work to oversee the implementation of infrastructure projects, despite the Ministry itself reiterating the same in a report to the PM and in an affidavit to the High Court of Delhi. “...in order to protect these corrupt elements, the respondent Ministry and Institute never allocated the work of monitoring of infrastructure projects to the applicant. The extent to which the Respondent Ministry can go in protection of these corrupt elements is obvious from the fact that the said work has not been allocated despite the ministry reiterating the same in a report sent to the Prime Minister and in an affidavit filed before the High Court of Delhi,” Chaturvedi told the Tribunal.

Chaturvedi says the government’s latest orders are “part of vindictive actions” because he has taken “lawful actions against corruption cases of politically influential institute officials, during his stint as Chief Vigilance Officer of the Institute from July 7, 2012 to August 14, 2014.” Mentioning 12 important cases, Chaturvedi says that in none of the cases for which he took action against officials, could they get relief from any court of law. These include those against IPS officer Shailesh Yadav, who was DD (Administration) at AIIMS, former Registrar VP Gupta and former Chief Administrative Officer Attar Singh. 

“The instant order is solely [intended] to finish the career of the applicant and to teach him a lesson for his lawful actions against powerful vested interests. Already the applicant has been rendered without any assignment by the respondents and his cadre transfer/deputation proposals to the Uttarakhand and Delhi Government have been blocked illegally as part of this victimisation strategy and more and more such moves on the part of respondents are in offing against the applicant,” Chaturvedi has submitted before the Tribunal, the report said.

Chaturvedi has also been at loggerheads with the Central government for a year about his transfer, alleging that he was been constantly targeted ever since he exposed corruption in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, where he was Chief Vigilance Officer, in which 'powerful politicians and bureaucrats' were involved. Soon after, he was removed as CVO by former Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan. He has been trying to change his cadre from Haryana as his work there also unearthed several cases of corruption in planting projects in Hisar and Jhajjar, involving officials and ministers in the then Congress state government. The investigation had led to the suspension of nine officers.

Earlier, the CAT had given a major relief to Chaturvedi and ordered the Appointments Committee of Cabinet (ACC) to reconsider his case for inter cadre deputation. In doing so, the CAT order quashed the PMO's order, given via the Department of Personnel and Training, that had, in January, returned Chaturvedi's proposal for change of cadre from Haryana to Uttarakhand to square one, despite both state governments giving their consent for said change.

The CAT order had severely taken the Appointments Committee of Cabinet to task for "violating the rules of natural justice". It took cognisance of the threats Chaturvedi faced from the Haryana government for exposing scams involving politicians, stating that "the instances of harassment appear to be on the extreme side and deserve to be taken serious note of". It had strongly stated that "we do hope that a situation may never arise, where honesty is punished and corruption rewarded. Such a system cannot be expected to last for a long time."

While directing the ACC to reconsider Chaturvedi's proposal "expeditiously" it also gave Chaturvedi the option of approaching the CAT again in case "the order of the competent authority on his representation does not match up to his satisfaction and expectation".

With agency inputs