Sanjiv Chaturvedi

Sanjiv Chaturvedi (born 21 December 1974) is an Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer and currently a deputy secretary at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).^[2][3] He also served as a Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) at AIIMS during 2012-14.

Indian Forest Service in Haryana

Sanjiv Chaturvedi is a 1995 batch Electrical Engineer from Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology (NIT Allahabad) and a 2002 batch Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer from the Haryana cadre. He was ranked second in the IFS exam, and won two medals for excellence as a trainee.

Kurukshetra

His first posting was in Kurukshetra, where he registered an FIR against contractors involved in the construction of Hansi Butana canal. He accused the contractors of illegal tree felling and poaching hog deer in the nearby Saraswati Wildlife Sanctuary. He was reprimanded by the Principal Secretary (Forests), and transferred to Fatehabad on 30 May 2007.^[4][5]

Fatehbad

In Fatehbad, Chaturvedi accused the Congress MLA Prahlad Singh Gillakhera of corruption in a herbal park establishment project. He alleged that Gillakhera's relatives were buying rare trees for their personal gardens with the taxpayers' money.^[6][5]

Chaturvedi was placed under suspension by the Haryana chief minister without citing any reasons in the order on August 3, 2007. He was punished for resisting corruption. In April 2008, a voluntary organisation Ekta Parishad moved court in the herbal park case. In August, 2008 the Prime Minister's Office sought a reply in the matter from the state but Hooda government did not respond.

On 3 August 2007, the Chief Minister of Haryana suspended Chaturvedi without specifying any reason. On 14 September 2007, the Government issued a charge-sheet to dismiss him from service. However, on 3 January 2008, the suspension order was revoked by the President of India Pratibha Patil, who also passed strictures against the Hooda Government. Even after this, the Hooda Government did not withdraw the charge-sheet against Chaturvedi; its forest minister Kiran Choudhry returned the file for further comments.^[5] The Hooda Government blocked his promotion by keeping the charge-sheet pending for more than three years.^[7]

Soon after his suspension, the Haryana Forest Department had started prosecution against the contractors, based on earlier reports filed by him. However, after the NGO Ekta Parishad moved against the accused in the Supreme Court in April 2008, the Hooda Government protected the violators.^[4][5]

Jhajjar

After his suspension order was revoked by the President in January 2008, Chaturvedi was assigned to a non-cadre post. After objections from the Central Administrative Tribunal, he was posted as a divisional forest officer (DFO) in Jhajjar, in January 2009. There, he exposed a fake plantation scam in February. Several crores of rupees of public money had been embezzled in this scam. The expose resulted in charge-sheets against 40 forest staffers and suspension of 10 staffers. Chaturvedi suspected that senior officers were involved in this multi-crore scam, and requested a vigilance probe.^[5]

Subsequently, Chaturvedi started facing harassment in form of bogus cases. In April 2009, a case was registered against him for misuse of funds and bogus plantation in Jhajjar district – this was the same case which had exposed corruption in.^[8] Later, the Hooda Government had to pay him compensation and concede in writing that he had been framed wrongly in this case.^[5]

Hisar

In August 2009, the Haryana Chief Minister's Office abruptly transferred Chaturvedi to Hisar (territorial) Division. In Hisar, Chaturvedi exposed yet another fake plantation scam. In January 2010, he sealed a plywood unit for corruption. In collusion with senior forest officers, this unit had paid just Rs. 26,000 (instead of Rs. 2,200,000) as license fee. In May 2010, when Chaturvedi went on official training in a foreign country for 18 days, the Chief Minister's Office declaraed his post vacant.^[5] Chaturvedi was left without a post for a month, after which he was made DFO (Production) in the same Division.^[9]

Harassment and Presidential intervention

Chaturvedi reported facing severe harassment after exposing multiple scams. Several bogus criminal cases were filed against him, including theft of a Kachnar tree and abetment to suicide (see Sanjeev Tomar case below).^[9] He also faced four inquiries by the Vigilance Bureau. During his tenure as an officer in Haryana, Chaturvedi was transferred 12 times.^[4][10] Chaturvedi's in-laws filed a dowry case against him, and his marriage ended in divorce. According to his supporters, his ex-wife was persuaded to believe that he sought the transfers to avoid her.^[6]

Alleging that he was being harassed by the Haryana State Government, Chaturvedi requested a Central Government deputation in 2010. He complained of harassment to the President Pratibha Patil, who referred his case to the Cabinet Secretariat. Acting on the directions of the Cabinet Secretariat, the Ministry of Environment and Forests constituted a two-member panel to study the accusations, in 2010. The Ministry's in-house inquiry found merit in Chaturvedi's allegations, and referred the case to CBI, whose preliminary analysis found the allegations worthy of investigation. The Ministry then referred the case to Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), and recommended a CBI investigation. The Ministry also confirmed the harassment of Chaturvedi and recommended quashing of cases against him. Accordingly, the chargesheet against him was quashed by the President on 19 January 2011.^[11]

The President's order indicted the Haryana State government for harassing Chaturvedi by blocking his promotion and transferring him.^[7] This was based on the panel report which reprimanded minister Kiran Chaudhary, the Chief Minister's Officer on Special Duty R. R. Beri as well as Prahalad Singh Gillakhera.^[12] The Hooda Government rejected the Ministry's findings, and asked it to take a fresh look at the case. However, this demand was rejected by the Ministry.^[11]

The Hooda Government refused to relieve Chaturvedi for Central deputation, but in May 2012, an order from the Ministry overruled the Hooda Government.^[4] Subsequently, in March 2013, the Hooda Government constituted an inquiry committee against Chaturvedi, accusing him of inefficiency. The committee recommended penalizing Chaturvedi, including his termination from the service. In October 2013, the President of India Pranab Mukherjee quashed this chargesheet, again passing strictures against Government of Haryana.^[13] After this, the Hooda Government tried to downgrade appraisal report of Chaturvedi, however, this order of Hooda Government was again reversed by President of India which restored his gradings as outstanding.^[14]

Overall, the President of India passed four orders in support of Chaturvedi during 2008-2014, quashing the Hooda Government's orders.^[15]

Sanjeev Tomar case

In 2009, Sanjeev Tomar, a Haryana forest range officer, was found dead after initiation of anti-corruption proceedings against him. His father Rampal Singh Tomar initially told the police that Sanjeev had died due to other reasons. Later, he changed his statement and claimed that his son had committed suicide due to harassment by Chaturvedi and subsequent suspension.^[16] According to the Jhajjar Superintendent of Police, Chaturvedi had nothing to do with suicide of Tomar, who was disturbed due to corruption and dowry cases against him.^[17] Multiple special investigation teams (SIT) formed to probe the case gave a clean chit to Chaturvedi. According to the SIT reports, Sanjeev Tomar had committed suicide because of an anti-corruption inquiry against him and also because he was facing litigation from his wife; he had been living with another woman named Promila.^[18]

In February 2015, the Punjab and Haryana High Court recommended formation of a new SIT to probe the allegations that Sanjeev Tomar had committed suicide due to harassment by Chaturvedi. This was based on a petition filed by the deceased's father, Rampal Singh Tomar. Chaturvedi moved in a review petition before the Court, challenging the orders to form an SIT.^[19] Chaturvedi's counsel had argued that the case had already been investigated by four different SITs and reviewed by senior police officers, who had found no evidence of harassment. He stated that constituting a fresh SIT would amount to hounding the officer who had exposed several scams. In April 2015, the Court accepted the petition, and recalled its earlier order. The Court also dismissed the writ petition of Rampal Singh.^[16]

Intelligence Bureau Report

The Intelligence Bureau (IB) had prepared a report on threats and harassment to the officer. When the copy of this report was sought by him under RTI Act, intelligence bureau denied it on the ground that IB is an exempted organization. However, somehow the gist of the report was disclosed in which contentions of Chaturvedi were found to be true. Subsequently, Central Information Commission in a very detailed order in April 2016 slammed Intelligence Bureau and citing four extra ordinary presidential orders passed in his favor, asked them to disclose the report to Chaturvedi.^[20]

AIIMS

On 29 June 2012, Chaturvedi was made the Deputy Secretary of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Delhi. He was also given the additional charge of Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) at AIIMS. As a CVO, Chaturvedi took action against the doctors who were making unauthorized foreign trips. During his tenure, the police seized banned drugs worth ₹ 6 crore from a vehicle supplying drugs to an on-campus pharmacy owned by an Indian National Congress MLA. The then health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, signed two internal reports which rated Chaturvedi's work as a CVO as "outstanding".^[10] Chaturvedi initiated actions in around 200 corruption cases during his stint as AIIMS CVO; punishment was imposed in 78 cases, chargesheet was issued in 87 cases and more than 20 cases were referred to CBI for criminal investigation. These cases included the ones against former Deputy Director (Administration) Shailesh Yadav, former Registrar V.P. Gupta and former Chief Administrative Officer Attar Singh.^[21]

In 2014, Chaturvedi was relieved from the additional charge of CVO, although he continued to retain the Deputy Director post at AIIMS.^[22] On August 16, he wrote a letter to the new health minister Harsh Vardhan of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), alleging that his removal from the CVO post was a result of campaign by corrupt officials. He was supported by AIIMS staff, who wrote a letter to the Prime Minister asking for his reinstatement. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) held protests in his support. The media and the AAP alleged that the BJP leader JP Nadda was acting against Chaturvedi on behalf of Vineet Chaudhary, an IAS officer from his own state, Himachal Pradesh. As a CVO, Chaturvedi had accused Chaudhary of bending rules to give tenure extension to an engineer supervising works worth ₹ 3,700 crore. Nadda had reportedly started the proposal for removal of Chaturvedi with a letter, on which 20 signatures were added within 24 hours.^[23] Chaturvedi had also accused two security contractor firms of serious violations, one of which was owned by the BJP Rajya Sabha MP RK Sinha.^[10][24]

Harsh Vardhan stated that Chaturvedi had been removed because was not eligible for the CVO post, and the government had no malafide intention in the decision. He pointed out that a 2012 letter by CVC indicated that he had been appointed as CVO without the Commission's approval. He stated that this was brought to his attention recently, and the step of removing Chaturvedi was taken accordingly. He also stated that the CVO function was being duplicated at the Ministry and AIIMS levels, and that JP Nadda had no role to play in Chaturvedi's removal. He also pointed out that Chaturvedi had not been removed from AIIMS, and continued to be its Deputy Secretary.^[25][26] However, media reports alleged that J. P. Nadda played a role in Chaturvedi's removal from the CVO post.^[27][28]

After Chaturvedi's controversial removal, Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked Harsh Vardhan for a report on the case. In the resulting report, the Health Secretary Lov Verma argued that AIIMS did not have any independent post of CVO, and Chaturvedi had been given only additional charge as an "internal arrangement." The newspapers DNA such as The Economic Times alleged that several facts about Chaturvedi's appointment and removal were concealed from the Prime Minister in this report.^[23][29]

Subsequently, JP Nadda became the Health Minister in November 2014. In February 2015, the Delhi High Court issued notices to the Central Government and J.P Nadda, in resposne to a PIL filed by Prashant Bhushan demanding CBI investigation into all pending corruption cases and removal of Chaturvedi as CVO.^[30] Nadda's ministry attempted to re-write Chaturvedi's Appraisal Report, which had described his performance as outstanding. However, in June 2015, the Central Administrative Tribunal restrained Nadda from doing this.^[31] In June 2015, Chaturvedi petitioned the Central Administrative Tribunal to grant him promotion to Director (selection grade), which he had been scheduled to receive in January, but which had been blocked due to his anti-corruption stance. Following a court order, Chaturvedi received his promotion with effect from 1 January.^[2]

In August 2015, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare accused the Health Ministry of not taking any action against the corruption in AIIMS. It also criticized the replacement of the dedicated CVO post with a Ministry CVO.^[32] The same month, Chaturvedi stated that he was disappointed with the Modi government for not taking any action in these corruption cases.^[33]

By December 2015, all the tasks assigned to Chaturvedi at AIIMS had been withdrawn, although he was being paid the full salary.^[34] In July 2016, Chaturvedi filed an affidavit before the Delhi High Court, alleging that the Ministry had not taken any action against the accused in the pending AIIMS corruption cases exposed by him.^[35]

Change to Uttrakhand Cadre

In October 2012, Chaturvedi had applied for change of his cadre from Haryana to Uttrakhand on the grounds of ‘extreme hardship’ including frequent transfers, suspension and false cases. After the approvals of both the State Government Ministry of Environment and Forest also recommended for a cadre change in July, 2014, to the appointment Committee of Cabinet (ACC) headed by the Prime Minister. However, on 28 January 2015, ACC ordered to bring fresh NOC from both the State Governments. This order was challenged by the officer in Central Administrative Tribunal, which first stayed and then quashed this order in May, 2015, giving two months time to the ACC for passing order on Cadre Change. On 13 August 2015, the ACC led by the Prime Minister approved the Cadre Change in compliance with Tribunal orders.^[36]

In 2015, the media reported that AAP was planning to appoint Chaturvedi as the chief of the Delhi anti-corruption bureau.^[37] On 17 February 2015, and again on 28 February 2015, Delhi's Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal wrote to Cabinet Minister Prakash Javdekar, asking for deputation of Chaturvedi to Delhi, as an Officer on Special Duty. The Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) directed the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare to give its assent to Chaturvedi's deputation to the Delhi Government.^[38]

In October 2015, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, also gave consent and also Government of Uttarakhand, parent cadre, after which courts directed that Prime Minister led Appointments Committee of the Cabinet(ACC) to take a decision by 05.01.2016.^[39] However, in a very strange development, Government of Uttarakhand suddenly withdrew its consent in January 2016, allegedly under pressure from Central Government. This consent was restored again in February–March 2016 by Government of Uttarakhand ^[40] and after that courts again directed ACC to decide the case expeditiously. However, in an order passed on 21.06.2016 Prime Minister led ACC rejected this proposal on the ground that the officer had not completed requisite cooling off period between two deputations. However, in letter written to Prime Minister in July 2016, Delhi Chief Minister Mr. Kejriwal pointed out that as per rules criteria of cooling off is not applicable in case of appointment to personal staff.^[41] He also requested Prime Minister to allow this deputation in the interest of people of Delhi.^[42]

Awards and recognition

• Two medals in the subjects of “People and Forest” and “Biodiversity and Wildlife Management”, from the then President of India, APJ Abdul Kalam in August, 2005 after completion of training at Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy, Dehradun.
• Manjunath Shanmugam Integrity Award (2009), for his work in Haryana^[43]
• S R Jindal Prize in 2011 for "Crusade against Corruption" with a cash prize of Rs. 10 Lakhs, for his efforts in exposing corruption in high places.^[44]
• Ramon Magsaysay Award for emergent leadership (2015): Chaturvedi was recognized for "his exemplary integrity, courage and tenacity in uncompromisingly exposing and painstakingly investigating corruption in public office, and his resolute crafting of program and system improvements to ensure that government honorably serves the people of India."^[45]

Chaturvedi donated his $30,000 Magsaysay Award cash to AIIMS for treatment of poor patients.^[46] However, AIIMS returned the cheque subsequently in November 2015, after which he issued a fresh check in the name of Prime Minister National Relief Fund (PMNRF), with a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi accusing J.P Nadda of being biased against him.^[47] Initially Prime Minister Office rejected the donation, stating that it cannot accept funds with conditions. Later, the donation was accepted after Chaturvedi clarified that he had not imposed any conditions.^[48]

Chaturvedi has been invited by National Police Academy (Hyderabad), National Administrative Academy (Mussourie), and National Forest Academy (Dehradun) for delivering lecture to senior officers and probationers on issue of anti-corruption strategies.^[49]

References