Tuesday 10 April 2012

Indian Army's Top Corruption Scandals

By SiliconIndia | Tuesday, 27 March 2012, 05:48 Hrs      
http://www.siliconindia.com/news/general/Indian-Armys-Top-Corruption-Scandals-nid-110443-cid-1.html


Bangalore: Corruption scandals, one after another, have taken the Indian Army’s morale to a new low. The image of the Indian defense establishment in the public perception is not far from an untrustworthy police officer and the rot within the ‘soon going to be’ “once-prestigious Indian Army” is becoming increasingly clear with the recent developments. As in politics, corruption is a deep-rooted cancerous culture in the army and has a long history to be traced.

With Defense Minister AK Antony ordering a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) investigation into Army Chief General V.K. Singh's allegation, here is a low-down on some of the scams that rocked the defence ministry since 2007 and the outcome of the investigations.


Army Chief Offered a 14 Crore Bribe


Dropping a bombshell, Army Chief General V.K. Singh alleged that an equipment lobbyist offered him a bribe of 14 crore, which he had reported to the Defence Minister AK Antony. In an interview to a newspaper, he said the offer was made for approving the supply of 600 sub-standard vehicles to the army.

He also made it clear that he had brought the matter to the notice of Defence Minister A.K. Antony soon after the offer was made to him.


"Just imagine, one of these men had the gumption to walk up to me and tell me that if I cleared the tranche, he would give me Rs 14 crore. He was offering a bribe to me, to the Army chief. He told me that people had taken money before me and they will take money after me," Gen Singh said during the interview.


However, retired Lieutenant General Tejinder Singh refuted allegations that he had offered bribe to army chief VK Singh and said that no conversation related to any purchase or deal took place the last time he had met him. "I had last met General VK Singh sometimes in September 2010 which is more than year and a half ago, and it was on a personal matter which I don't want to elaborate at this stage," Singh said.

Adarsh Housing Society Scam


The case involves top armed forces officers and defence estate officers issuing a no-objection certificate to Adarsh Housing Society, comprising retired and serving personnel, to build a 31-storey housing complex with 104 flats. The building came up on a 6,450 square metre plot of land inside a high security naval campus in upscale Colaba area of Mumbai.

Originally proposed as a housing scheme for widows of Kargil martyrs, it later came to light that politicians, bureaucrats and senior defence officers including three former army and navy chiefs had got flats allotted to them by misusing their official positions.


It also came to light that several norms relating defence land had been violated including issuing of no-objection certificates to enable the construction of the housing society.


The scam hit headlines in 2009 and later, the probe was handed over to the CBI, which has last week arrested several former armed forces officers including a retired major general and a brigadier .


Among those named as part of the beneficiaries of the housing society were former army chiefs Gen. Deepak Kapoor and Gen. N.C. Vij, and former navy chief Admiral Madhavendra Singh. The three officers, after their names became public as Adarsh beneficiaries, returned the flats.

Sukhna Land Scandal

Two senior lieutenant generals and a major general were named in converting a 70-acre land adjacent to Sukna military station in Siliguri of West Bengal into an educational institution by handing it over to a private trust.


The controversy involved issuing of no-objection certificate for the private trust to buy the land for construction of the educational institution on the condition that wards of army personnel from Sukna military station too would get to study there.


Then army chief Gen. Deepak Kapoor's military secretary Lt. Gen. Avadesh Prakash and then 33 Corps commander Lt. Gen. P.K. Rath were court martialled in the case and punished for their involvement in the alienation of the 70-acre land that was originally a tea estate.


The court martial had dismissed Lt. Gen. Avadesh Prakash from service after finding him guilty in the case.

Ration Supplies Scam

The case of a scam in ration supplies to army personnel in high altitude areas broke out in 2007 and then Army Service Corps chief Lt. Gen. S.K. Sahni was found guilty in the case in 2011 and dismissed from service.


Sahni had retired from service when he was court martialled and cashiered from service.


Frozen Meat Scam


Another Army Service Corps top officer, Lt. Gen. S.K. Dahiya, was also indicted in a separate case involving irregularities in the procurement of frozen meat for troops posted in Ladakh and discrepancies in procurement of dry rations in early 2007.


Dahiya is now retired from service, though he was awarded a recordable censure by the Northern Army commander for the offences.

Ordnance Factory Board Scam:

The defence ministry, earlier this month, debarred six defence firms -- four of them foreign -- from any future deals with Indian ordnance factories for the next 10 years, after they were named in a graft case involving former Ordnance Factory Board director general Sudipto Ghosh.


The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which investigated the case, had filed a charge sheet against Ghosh in June 2010 in Kolkata and recommended the blacklisting of the firms -- Singapore Technologies Kinetics (STK), Israeli Military Industries (IMI), Switzerland's Rheinmetall Air Defence, Corporation Defence Russia, New Delhi-based T.S. Kishan and Company Private Limited and Ludhiana-based R.K. Machine Tools Limited.

1 comment:

  1. excellent article...
    Hadoop training in hyderabad.All the basic and get the full knowledge of hadoop.Hadoop online training
    With the technological advancements professionals and learners need to keep themselves updated and match the pace. For an example, sorting and tracking Big Data requires enough skilled man power.

    ReplyDelete