This raises the apprehension that the government is not serious about empowering the premier investigation agency.
Last Tuesday, as the media and economic analysts scrutinised the good, the bad and the ugly of budget 2011, one cut went relatively unnoticed.
CBI, which is probing some of the biggest corruption cases in the country, including the Rs1.76 lakh-crore 2G spectrum scam, was awarded a 9% budget cut. This raises the apprehension that the government is not serious about empowering the premier investigation agency.
“Government does not want CBI to function. Instead of strengthening the country’s top investigating agency, it is starving it by reducing funds,” former CBI director Joginder Singh told DNA.
“We blame the agency for poor conviction rate. But by reducing budget allocation, the government has made it clear that it is not serious about the probe agency’s work,” he said.
“The ongoing probe in the 2G scam is taking place only because the Supreme Court [SC] is closely monitoring it,” he added.
CBI was expecting an enhanced budget considering its long-standing demand for infrastructural reforms. But it was allocated only Rs318.28 crore as opposed to Rs350.14 crore last year.
The amount was allocated for establishment-related expenditure of CBI, which is entrusted with investigation of corruption cases against public servants, private persons and firms and other serious crime.
The budget cut comes despite the fact that CBI is working at half its strength. The agency has about 6,000 personnel on its rolls and each investigating officer handles around 25-30 cases at any given point.
Just last month, appalled to hear that 30% of CBI’s senior posts (20% superintendent of police and 10% sub-inspector posts) were vacant, SC directed the government to fill the posts immediately and file an action-taken report within four weeks.
The shortage of personnel and an increasing trend of handing CBI cases that ideally police should investigate has taken a toll on its ability to close investigations on time.
“The original mandate of CBI was to investigate corruption-related cases. But we have been asked to probe other serious crimes such as murder too. Our mandate has been extended but no sincere efforts are being made to increase our resources,” a CBI officer said.
“CBI has always been blamed for delayed investigation. But nobody looks at the other side. Take the Aarushi-Hemraj murder case; it was transferred to CBI a fortnight after the incident. When our team visited the crime scene, it had been tampered with and we could barely pick up any forensic evidence, which is crucial to any investigation,” the officer added.
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