Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, July 8: JKNPP chairman and former Minister Harshdev Singh today alleged that handpicked Jammu officers were made sacrificial lambs to be showcased in the Government’s so called crusade against corruption.
In a statement, he said that premature retirement of dozens of officers belonging to Jammu region by serving a single line notice that their services were no longer required without mentioning the charges, allegations or the offences against them had created lot of doubts and apprehensions in the minds of civil society as well as the employees class. He said that suspicions were rife that while favourites were pampered and coddled despite their adverse antecedents, the ‘inconvenients’ were being thrown out in the name of ‘dead wood’ and ‘corrupt’.
“There are several tainted officers in the bureaucracy including IAS, IPS and KPs who have numerous cases pending against them with several established cases of mis-conduct and corruption but they were allowed to enjoy prized postings and contrarily the axe has fallen on several officers who reportedly had not a single case pending against them,” he explained and alleged that glaring manipulations and pick and choose was adopted in the process of termination of Government functionaries
Maintaining that elimination of corruption is one of the foremost responsibilities of any Government and every dispensation is fully empowered to punish its guilty officers and other public functionaries, Harshdev added that the State should use the said power judicially with utmost caution and prudence. “Ouster of officials would be a welcome step if it is unbiased and unprejudiced. But state is not a private limited company which can order the forced termination of its regular employees merely by issuance of a single line order and a three months notice simply at its whims and fancies,” he asserted and added that the termination involves not only deprivation of livelihood but the larger issue of lifelong social stigma which necessitate establishment of charges against the accused before imposition of such sanguinary penalty.
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