The campaign invites readers to write to DNA about their personal experiences of dealing both with red tape and corruption.
The campaign invites readers to write to DNA about their personal experiences of dealing both with red tape and corruption. The focus is our reader and the problems he or she faces on a day-to-day basis. Be it the corruption involved in procuring basic tools like a ration card, passport or a driving license. This might well include corruption involved in getting a birth or death certificate.
Or, else be it a case of delayed or rejected income tax refund or an insurance claim denied by the public sector insurer, the series aims to highlight such cases and more with a view to take the fight against corruption to the grass root level. To widen the scope you may also send us corruption or red tape episodes involved in the small and medium enterprise to big business.
The message is stay away from paying a penny as an extraneous consideration. Paying bribe is as much a crime as bribe seeking. DNA would ensure your identity is protected so long you have a genuine case backed by evidence. Each case would be scrutinized for its veracity. The objective of the campaign is not to target individuals or to malign the institution of bureaucracy but to highlight rampant corrupt practices on the ground.
In today’ episode we bring you three case studies, each carrying a tale of alleged neglect and apathy.
Case 1:
Income Tax Refund
City: Mumbai
Name: Withheld
Department: Income tax Department
Case Study: This senior citizen’s (aged 69 years) life is getting difficult by the day! The old man, who lost his wife recently, has been seeking his IT refund but of no avail. He says he got intimation from the department through his bank where he had filed his return for a personal hearing for the settlement of Rs 14,720 which is due from the department. He has alleged that after submitting his income tax return for year 2011-12 through e- filling he got an “advice from State Bank of India (Lalbaug Branch) of adjusting Rs 15,160 for the assessment year of 2007-08.” He says he is in mourning and is being made to run around to get his due from the Income tax department. “How can an old year assessment are opened now when there is no income tax pending from me for assessment year 2007-08?” he asked.
Case 2:
Unauthorized Construction
City: Mumbai
Name: Withheld
Department Concerned: Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM)
Case Study: This is the story of an unauthorized construction of seven storey building in Kailas Nagar, Mumbai, as alleged by a prominent residential housing society in the adjoining area. The Society has been fighting for about a year against the illegal construction and has written to the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (M.C.G.M) several times but no action has been taken so far. The residential society office bearers have alleged that the said plot had no Floor Space Index (FSI) available. They also feared that post construction of the plot there would be no access for fire-engines in case of any emergency. As alleged by the members of society living near the plot, an under construction building has come up on the plot which was earlier leased to a HPCL petrol pump, which was allegedly sold to a builder four year ago.
Case 3:
Sponsorship Corruption
City: Mumbai
Name: Withheld
Department concerned: Health Department, Maharashtra
Case Study: This is the story of a government doctor who is being denied allegedly a chance to go to Chennai for higher studies because of corruption in the department. “I have been selected and provisionally admitted for higher study course at centrally run Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) promoted N.I.E. unit at Chennai. I have neither yet got neither my sponsorship nor the deputation certificate. The last date for submission (January 09 has passed). All this is due to high corruption in Public Health Department of Maharashtra. This is my last chance to do this course due to age limit criteria as I would turn 40 and become ineligible,” he alleged. The doctor has been working as ad-hoc medical officer in Maharashtra state since 1997.
You too can narrate your case study with relevant documentation. You may email us at dna-zrg@zeenetwork.com or write to us at Zee Research Group (ZRG), New Building, Zee Network, Film City, Sector 16A, Noida.
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