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| nationalheraldindia.com |
The image of India’s premier investigating agency, the
Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), lies in tatters as the sordid drama
involving extortion, bribe and corruption by top ranking officers unfolds. What
is so scandalous is that the CBI, which is supposed to probe corruption
charges, is itself seeped so deeply in unscrupulous dealings that the credibility
of such an organization has become questionable. That the agency has been
misused by successive governments as a Special Purpose Vehicle against their political
rivals is not something that is a secret. But the rapid erosion of the agency’s
image in recent years makes a mockery of its motto which is Industry,
Impartiality, Integrity. Given the dubious image that the agency has earned for
itself in recent years, its epigram should rather read Inertia, Immortality,
Impropriety.
Had it been industrious and not inertial, the agency would
not have received flak from the Supreme Court time and again over the shoddy
investigations it carried out in various scams and corruption cases. Had it been impartial in its probes, it would
not have lost the confidence of the Supreme Court forcing it to denounce the once-famed
elite agency as a “caged parrot” and “its master’s voice”. Had the CBI lived up
to its integrity, the political class could not have mustered courage to
arm-twist it for its cover-up operations. That the top leadership of the agency
has allowed itself to be subjected to political influence shows that some of
its officers are a willing party to dirty tricks and corrupt means for personal
gains and official lollipops.
Never in the history of CBI has it happened that its chief and
the number two were unceremoniously sidelined in a midnight coup and virtually rendered
ineffective. The situation was warranted after the top two officers of the CBI were
involved in ugly spat, and openly revolted against each other making a
spectacle of once respectful and fearful agency. More drama followed as more
than a dozen officers supposedly close to both the two top officers were
transferred late night by an interim director, who is not even seen above
suspicion. No guesses here, under whose orders he carried out mass transfers,
that too, in the dead of the night. The murky drama did not end there as the
following morning four men from Intelligence Bureau were arrested for allegedly
snooping on the CBI boss exiled a few hours ago. What is more to this sordid
drama is that there are also names of a senior Research and Analysis Wing (RAW)
officer and a former Chief Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) doing the rounds in the
imbroglio. So you have almost all the important security wings of the country,
internal as well as external, involved in this spectacle endangering the
national interests.
Was it only the turf war between the CBI chief Alok Verma
and his deputy Rakesh Asthana, a Gujarat cadre officer, who was brought into
the agency as a special director? There is something more than the personal ego
battle between the two officers. While Alok Verma is seen as the protégé of
National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Rakesh Asthana was handpicked by Prime
Minister Narendra Modi. Interestingly, Asthana was appointed as the special
director of the CBI in October 2017, two months after an FIR was filed against
him in a 3.8 crore rupee bribery case relating to Sterling Biotech. Is it not
bizarre that an officer, whose name figures in the investigation in the
Sterling Biotech case, is promoted to CBI? Alok Verma had opposed Asthana’s appointment
as special director citing his alleged connection with the Sterling Biotech
bribery case. But his objection was overruled. Did Verma not do the right thing
by red flagging Asthana’s appointment? But could he go beyond a point if the
government of the day refused to see anything wrong in Asthana’s case? Asthana
backers, however, claim that he has not been named in the FIRs filed by either
the Enforcement Directorate or the Central Bureau of Investigation though the
diaries seized during the Sterling investigations had notings with initials
“RA”. A benefit of doubt for Asthana!
Why Asthana was the blue-eyed boy of the government or the
Prime Minister Office in particular that all objections against him were swept
under the carpet? Asthana, who is credited to have overseen several high
profile cases like coal scam, AugustaWestland scam, black money and money
laundering cases, has seen meteoric rise since he was moved to Gujarat at the
height of the Godhra riots. It all began with his appointment as Inspector
General of Vadodara and his territorial jurisdiction included Godhra. His
appointment had raised several eyebrows then because there were many senior
officers other than him who were bypassed for the post. His handling of the
Godhra probe had brought him closer to the state establishment. That he would
land a plum posting in the CBI if Narendra Modi became the prime minister was a
foregone conclusion.
Over the years, India’s premier agency is being
systematically deprecated by successive governments for fixing political
opponents and tampering with investigation in several criminal as well as
corruption cases. If the CBI finds today in profound mess, the governments at
the Centre are to be blamed. Sadly, the image of the agency has been mauled
beyond repairs that it is often referred to as the dirty tricks department of
the government of the day. This does not augur well for India.
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