What I believe life in Paradise is this. The literal meaning of Paradise is heaven as I learnt it from the Bible; it denotes the third Heaven. Paradise is the place where the saved souls will inhabit eternally. It is a country of bliss as God will provide everything in plenty. That country is filled with joy, contentment and happiness as equality is the rule for life and as the environment is totally bereft of evil –Satan and cohorts are bound and imprisoned in Hades forever and from where none can escape.
Beside, in that country, there is no law for punitive measures for the reason that every citizen is immune from blame and suspicion. Each citizen has, by grace, becomes perfect in the eye of the Ruler. None of the citizens of that country has the tendency to commit sin nor any evil is present to tempt anyone to lust for sin. Therefore, the country has no Police as no force is required to remain vigil on wrongdoing. There is no law court as without law the establishment of court does not arise or required for there is no case to try. There is no prison as there is no citizen who is required to be imprisoned. Thus, that country has no such imposing and frightful infrastructure except the infrastructure of freedom.
The Reports of Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India was presented in the last session of Nagaland Assembly. Subsequently, local papers repeatedly highlighted immense anomalies committed in many Govt. departments relating to misappropriation of funds. However, the agency of CAG in Nagaland seems to have strong tendencies to skip and shelve the most sensitive and bigger scams by bigger rats. In such business, the said agency is not free from stigma. However, the layman have to rely only on those corrupt evidences so published in the media, and here the readers are once again reminded of how the State of Nagaland is run today.
1. Brown Sugar Seizure: In this case of seizure of 6.9 kgs of brown sugar on 3rd. August, 2018, the IGP, (CID), now under suspension, did neither register the criminal case against the peddlers nor the case was entered in the General Diary while releasing the two black marketers from whom the drug was seized along with their vehicle, with the condition that they have to bring the kingpin, kept the drug in PHQ store and then took it to his residence saying that his house was safer than the Police Store are simply funny. Beside, the way the IGP (CID) was conveniently manipulating the whole issue without timely intervention of the higher authority is looked murky. It took almost 3 months, from 3.8.2018 till the fake end of October, 2018 for the State Govt. to decide to suspend the officer. The way the concerned authorities who handled such serious matter casually and lethargically appears to be of clandestine joint venture. The suspended officer is the ringleader and for which he deserves punitive action and yet shelving the issue under the guise of taking action against a single officer will amount to scuttling the case. This case needs comprehensive investigation so as to bring it to a logical conclusion.
Very minimum percentage of student population belonged to creamy layer whose parents have more than enough to finance their education. Whereas, absolute majority of our students who enjoy Scholarships are poor. Thousands depend on their scholarships to make both ends meet. The responsible authorities in Technical Education Department refusing to acknowledge the hardships and struggles of pooper section of parents in financing their children education is un-Christian. See the exposures of the CAG as to how the Technical Education Department has been misusing the Scholarship funds from three Scholarship Schemes, namely, State Technical Scholarship, Merit-cum-Mean based Scholarship and Post Metric Scholarship as published by local papers dated 22nd September, 2018. Being conscious of space, inclusion of the analysis here is not advisable. Only brief instances of how funds released to Technical Department have been grossly misused. For 2014-15 and 2015-16, a total amount of Rs.3.30 crore was released to Technical Directorate. Out of Rs.3.30 crore, Rs. 1.81 lakh was paid to students during 2015-16 and 2016-17 respectively leaving a balance of Rs.1.49 crore. Out of Rs.1.49 crore, Rs.35 lakh was spent for admission fee of 3 MBBS students from backward tribes. The question is, was there a precedence that Govt. of Nagaland had financed such category of students opted for medical studies in addition to general scholarship? If so, had the concerned Department done justice to all deserved students? Will the Technical Department continue with the financing of such scheme? Also, Rs.40.01 lakh was spent for bidding adieu to a retired Director of Technical Department. Fantastic! The expenditure to the tune of Rs.40 lakh or more or less for such farewell function for anybody should have been born by the serving staff and not out of the State’s exchequer. How a Department, the public office, is being run in the manner of a private set up? Again, how students scholarship fund of Rs.5.12 lakh was spent for purchase of computers/laptops and payment of salaries to fixed pay employees. Thus, out of Rs.1.49 crore, Rs.80.13 lakh was misused.
Beside, out of Rs.1.49 crore (Rs.1.49 crore-Rs.80.13 lakh=Rs.68.87 lakh) Rs.68.87 lakh was supposed to be the balance. Whereas, as per CAG report, only Rs.51.87 was the balance with a shortfall of Rs.17 lakh. Out of Rs.51.87 crore, “advances were granted to some staff” including a retired Director in Technical Department. It said that that retired Director returned Rs.18 lakh against Rs.40 lakh which was taken as loan and the remaining Rs.22 lakh will be cleared in ‘instalments’. Whether this balance amount was returned or not? Amazing! In this way Rs.51.87 lakh was drawn through self-cheque and as per CAG report, there was no documentary evidence of the said amount being remitted to Scholarship Account. The students organisations are to fight for its members, and yet none bothers since their priorities become secondary.
The CAG Report tabled in the last NLA session also points out that under DUDA, several infrastructural projects for Education, Health, Agri. and Social were taken up under the cover of Border Area Development Programme (BADP). For these, payments amounting to Rs.31.89 crore were made. Whereas, those payments were made without execution of works including release of payments against abandoned works. To cross check the implementation of programmes, the third party inspection agency was supposed to be constituted under BADP was found ignored. During 2012-2017, under BADP, works such as construction of roads, bridges, community centres, drainage, school buildings, etc. were taken up covering 116 villages and involving Rs.123.69 crores. However, as above, payments were released against short executions and no executions.
CAG report stated that this Department furnished Utilization Certificate (UC) for an amount of Rs.12.79 crore even before the fund was released to the Department by State Govt. An amount of Rs.2.78 crore was paid twice against a single project which was ultimately abandoned. CAG report pointed out that Rs.3.98 crore was paid for 7 unexecuted projects, and again, Rs.16.37 crore was paid for 6 short executed projects. During the period from 2012-15, the Department recorded to have developed a total area of 231.15 hectares of Water Spread Area(WSA) under 6 projects at the cost of Rs. 21.77 crore. Whereas, the joint inspection conducted during summer of 2017 discovered that a mere 14.63 hectares of WSA as against 231.15 was developed. The short execution of 216.52 hectares of WSA resulted in excess expenditure of Rs.16.37 crore.
CAG detected unauthorised enhancement of rate of contract by which financial benefit to the tune of Rs.7.37 crore was given to a contractor. Housing Department also incurred an avoidable expenditure of Rs.10.73 crore due to delay in handing over a project site.
CAG reported that not less than 5 of its Drawing and Disbursing Officers fraudulently withdraw an amount of Rs.106.45 lakh against false bills.
CAG detected that the Project Director of DRDA, Kiphire released payment of Rs.2.03 crore against fictitious transportation challans and ghost vehicles in the guise of supply of CGI sheet. Misappropriation of Rs.73 lakh under IAY in Chiephobozou Block was detected.
Found from the exposures of CAG, the nodal department has been failing to ensure Drawing and Disbursing Officers(DDOs) to strictly adhere to prescribed rules while discharging duty. Rather, CAG reported that over the years, there have been connivance between Treasury Officers and DDOs in several cases whereby fraudulent drawals used to take place.
The rules are clear for any project to be executed under UDD, the Detailed Project Report(DPR) is mandatory as per the Sub-clause(ii) of Clause 8 of the Operational Guidelines. Whereas, the CAG report of March, 2017 stated that an amount of Rs.1.62 crore was wasted for haphazard development of burial and cremation project at Kiyakie, Kohima which had to be abandoned for lack of land encumbrance free certificate.
On 23.9.2018, the local papers exposed the CAG report on the project of Cultural Centre building at Touphema Village during 2012-13 involving Rs.6.68 crore. The Planning Department did not issue Work Order to the contractor and whereas, the contractor was asked to submit progress report, and accordingly the contractor showed that 70% of the project was completed and on the basis of which the Planning Deptt. made full payment. The CAG again detected that the Deptt. took up the same work and certified that it was completed in 2013 with another payment of Rs.1 crore to the same contractor, bringing the total sanction to Rs.20 crore. The CAG reported that the joint inspection found that the Cultural Centre building was a hoax as those payments were released against an Indoor Stadium constructed under MGNREGS (2013-14) as was found when cross audit with DRDA, Kohima was conducted.
Rangkau Mission Hostel building at Peren was certified to be completed in July, 2013 and accordingly the contractor was paid Rs.50 lakh. Whereas, when the inspection team verified it in June, 2017, it was just a single storey building and not as indicated as double storey building in the certification. Beside, the very building belonged to a private individual and no hostel is run there. Similar projects funded by Ministry of Tribal Affairs, GOI, namely, Skill Development Centre at Dimapur costing Rs.1.79 crore, Tribal Old Age Home at Pudumpukhuri, Dimapur costing Rs.1 crore, Tribal Co-education Centre at Khermahal, Dimapur costing Rs.1 crore and Community Training Institute at Burma Camp, Dimapur costing Rs.40 lakh were all found to be ghost projects by inspection team in 2017.
Whether locally produced mineral waters in Nagaland by private companies for public consumption with ISI trademark are of Reversed Osmosis(RO) quality or not is my doubt. These bottled waters are believed to be of scientifically filtered quality, and the consumers do not question the companies or distributors. Whether it is the mandatory responsibility of PHE Deptt. to monitor such quality drinking water production or not?
Whereas, the CAG reports revealed that the National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) launched in 2009 for the purpose of providing safe and sufficient drinking water to rural population by GOI, only 4.9% of households was covered. The CAG reveals that during 2012-17, PHED purchased galvanised water pipes worth Rs.241.81 crore without inviting tender. Also, the PHED released payments of Rs.2.67 crore and Rs.61 lakh for unexecuted works and short executed works respectively.
The PHED purchased water testing kits worth Rs.1.32 crore and yet those were not distributed to targeted areas. The laboratories in Dimapur, Kohima and Tuensang failed to carry out bacteriological and chemical contamination tests for supply of safe drinking water. Etc. Etc.
Thus, the total scenario of governance of Nagaland is nothing less than a grand syndicate. The syndicate is the grand alliance between the elected authority, the appointed authority of the State and the auditing authority representing CAG. The syndicate is illegally legitimized to simply loot the public exchequer without shame, fear or hesitation. This being the neo form of governance, the rule of discipline has disappeared into oblivion during the last one and half decade. There is high spirit of competition amongst the power holders to be more offensive and aggressive in corruption taking the advantage of the freedom to wrongdoing. The bigger scam one involves the better and the more popular one becomes.
Nagaland is therefore very similar to that of the aforementioned country. Nagaland has no laws practically. Whatever laws Nagaland has are in docile. We do not see the existing laws are used in running the govt. The saddest thing is the laws are thoroughly compromised and diluted. We do not come across anyone being booked for committing scams. We never come across any story of Govt, taking disciplinary measures against its disoriented public servant. Nagaland is therefore the heaven for the corrupt.
