Moneylife: Pune: Saturday, September 20, 2014.
According to
a reply procured under RTI, traffic can be stopped only for the President, the
Vice President, the PM and visiting foreign dignitaries who are given President
and PM level security cover
Most cases of
traffic being stopped or diverted for VIPs to pass, making our life difficult,
are illegal. Jammu-based RTI activist, Deepak Sharma was surprised to find out
that the police have no right to stop traffic for most VIPs that pass by. Fed
up of being inconvenienced due to all grades of ministers enjoying VIP
treatment on roads, he filed an RTI application, seeking information on who is
eligible for special privileges on roads.
The Ministry
of Home Affairs (MHA) replied that, traffic on roads can be stopped only in the
case of movement by the President of India, the Vice President, the Prime
Minister and visiting foreign dignitaries, who are given President and PM level
security cover.
This is what
the reply stated, “…it may be stated that as per guidelines issued by MHA in
consultation with Central Security Agencies, traffic is to be stopped only in
the case of President of India, the Vice President of India, the Prime Minister
of India and visiting foreign dignitaries who are given President and PM level
security cover so as to give them safe passage during movement by road.”
Stopping the
normal flow of traffic is just one way VIPs misuse their illegal privileges.
Here are many
other examples of, how VIPs flout rules unabashedly to pamper their cronies. An
RTI application filed with the MHA regarding nominations for the 2013 Padma
awards shockingly revealed that several VIPs nominated their family members and
friends for the prestigious awards.
As per the
RTI reply, there were 25 nominees, recommended by VIPs. Lata Mangeshkar had
nominated her sister Usha; Ustad Amjad Ali Khan had recommended both his sons,
Amaan and Ayaan; Congress MPs Motilal Vora and T Subbarami had recommended over
10 names and Amar Singh had nominated Jaya Prada. This was in gross violation
of the rules for application for Padma awards.
Another
example is of former aviation minister, Praful Patel, who is fighting hard to
defend himself regarding the purchase of the aircraft fleet. He would have no
voice when it comes to his daughters’ misdeeds during his tenure as minister.
Noted RTI activist, Subhash Chandra Agrawal, had filed an RTI application in
this regard.
The replies
were shocking. In April 2010, Patel’s daughter Avni Deshpande decided to have a
bigger Air India aircraft from Bangalore to Male in Maldives, as seven of her
family members from her in-laws side, could not be accommodated in the business
class, as it was full.
The RTI documents
show that directions were given by email from Mumbai office of Air India to
change the 'equipment' of Bangalore-Male flight on 25th April and
Male-Bangalore on 28 April 2010 from a smaller Airbus A319 to the larger A320.
Accordingly,
Air India provided a bigger plane so that the following members could travel in
business class: R V Deshpande, Radha Deshpande, Prasad Deshpande, Meghna
Deshpande and Master Dhruv, in addition to Avni and her husband Prashant
Deshpande. What is worse is that the reply states that the return flight went
half-empty, thus frittering away public money.
Similarly,
his other daughter, Poorna Patel: a Delhi-Coimbatore Air India flight was
cancelled 12 hours before departure as she turned it into a chartered flight so
that she could fly from Chandigarh to Chennai with some cricket players for an
Indian Premier League (IPL) match!
Pune-based
RTI activist, Vihar Durve, after the horrific incident of sexual assault on a
lady journalist in Mumbai, filed an RTI application, to procure information on
police security for VIPs in Maharashtra. His reply revealed that 64 VIPs have
812 policemen around them. Out of these, Sushilkumar Shinde, his wife and
daughter were surrounded by 66 security personnel. His wife alone had 14 policemen
to guard her. Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan enjoys the cover of
46 security guards while 31 security personnel protect Ajit Pawar, the deputy
CM. The reply shockingly revealed that out of 48,969 policemen on duty in
Mumbai, more than 55% or 27,740 are deployed for security of VIPs, while the
remaining over 21,000 cops attend to around two crore odd population of the
metro city.
Several RTI
applications have been filed regarding former President of India Pratibha
Patil, who spent Rs225 crore on foreign tours wherein she visited 45 countries
during her tenure as President. RTI applications filed by Subhash Chandra
Agrawal and others reveal that in most cases she took along with her, a large
contingent of her family members and friends. Several RTI applications had also
revealed how she tried to usurp a 2.60 lakh sq ft of prime Defence land in Pune
to build her home but a tenacious campaign through a series of articles in
Moneylife thwarted her dreams. She had to surrender the land and is now
residing in a smaller residence.
As for the
railways, the VIP quota is an accepted norm. Veeresh Malik, Delhi-based RTI
activist and Moneylife's Consulting Editor, has filed a series of applications
with the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Prime Minister's Office (PMO), the MHA, Ministry
of External Affairs, Ministry of Civil Aviation, Ministry of Surface Transport
and Ministry of Railways, and a few other government bodies, which use or used
the term ‘VIPs’.
However, he
says he has “never got anything close to a cogent definition of the term
(VIP).” The Railways, he says, has been more than helpful with the information
provided. Picking up from the reply,
Malik summarized that, “There is no definition for the term VIP, and apart from
the usual lot, pretty much anybody who holds a requisition from a 'High
Official' (yet another undefined term) qualifies to be one as far as
out-of-turn allotment of reservations is concerned. That letterheads of these
VIPs are regularly misused for reservations under emergency quota is a known
practice, and is also reported on in the media from time to time.”
Refreshingly,
the Balaji Temple in Tirupati wherein the VIP culture had reached insufferable
proportions has clamped down on VIP privileges. Earlier, with 5,000 VIPs
visiting the temple every day, thousands of common people had to wait for long
hours. Now, only 800-1000 VIPs are permitted per day, resulting in 10,000 more
common people being able to take the darshan.
VIP culture
simply mocks at democracy. It is up to us to become more assertive and put our
foot down against it. Like the Pak passengers who prevented XXX from boarding
the flight because he was two hours late, let us do it in our own way; click
photographs and take videos with your mobiles and post them on YouTube!
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