The CM who can do no wrong

Had the normal cut and thrust of politics, the parry and the feint to grab any inch of available political space, which has come to characterise the course of a politician been applied to Orissa, Naveen Patnaik would not have been its chief minister for a third consecutive term or a whopping twelfth year – with virtually no opposition in sight.

Here is a man, taciturn, key beneficiary of Biju Patnaik’s awesome legacy, a non-controversial chief minister whose personal conduct is above board and a politician to beat all politicians – and indeed everyone else – when it comes to social connections worldwide.

Any other chief minister confronted with the problems Patnaik has had to in the last year-and-a-half, would have caved in, or worse, slain for his incompetence by the media. Not this man though.

Consider the following:

•   A Rs 14,000 crore scam exposed in the mining sector

•   A Rs 1.25 billion loss to the state exchequer by diversion of subsidized coal to fake industrial units

•   A recent Rs 700 worth lentil scam has caused huge embarrassment for the Naveen Patnaik government – though not to Naveen himself - who has personally stayed clear of all charges.

•  Orissa High Court verdict in land acquisition for the Vedanta University came a dampener for the state government looking to invite   global companies to participate in the state's growth story in November 2010.

What is it that despite all the muck floating around, none ever sticks to the Orissa chief minister?

Political analysts feel that his third term may have considerably harmed his clean image and the proof of that could lie in the upcoming Panchayat polls six months down the line.

A recent RTI application by Biswajeet Mohanty, board member of Transparency International India (TII) has also become a cause of discomfort for the Chief Minister as it revealed that the popular Naveen was unable to find time from his busy schedule to listen to the grievances of common man.

TII members were also keen to know why the number of grievances had come down so steeply in the CM’s grievance cell, which was started with much fanfare in 2000. In its reply, the Public Grievance and Personnel Administration department of Orissa answered that the grievance cell hardly functioned during 2004-2007 as only two meetings were held, one in 2004 and the other in 2006.

While 12,034 aggrieved persons had approached the grievance cell in 2000, the volume fell dramatically to 408 in 2007 though the same number of meetings (12) were held. One of the reasons attributed to the chief minister’s Teflon-like qualities is his handling of the media – he just does not speak to them! Unlike other politicians looking for publicity, Naveen has shown little inclination to engage the media. In his 12-year tenure, he has had held only one formal press conference on March 6, 2000, well over a decade ago. Nor has all the shouting by the opposition in the Orissa assembly damaged Naveen’s prospects.

The last session of the Orissa legislative assembly was one of the most turbulent ever as the house was repeatedly stalled on the demand of presentation of vigilance investigation report of the dal scam and action taken report (ATR), which the government had promised at an all party meeting convened specifically for the purpose. Earlier this year it had been revealed that in several districts, the administration purchased and supplied sub-standard and rotten dal for the Mid-day Meal Scheme and Supplementary Nutrition Programme.

Scandalously, this below standard dal has been purchased at a price substantially higher than the market price.

After the exposure, the state government immediately ordered a vigilance inquiry into the supply and distribution of substandard pulses, even though the opposition firmly demanded a CBI probe. A later vigilance investigation found the involvement of two senior IAS officers who were suspended.

As the women and child development department was the nodal agency through which the pulse was being distributed to about 9.5 million beneficiaries including 5 million school children, the minister in charge of it resigned on moral grounds, even after the vigilance probe had given her a clean-chit.

This embarrassment threatened to turn into damage, when the opposition accused Patnaik of direct involvement in the purchase of sub-standard and rotten dal at a higher price.

While the chief minister has got away for the time being, there is a clear danger ahead because the Orissa High Court has admitted a PIL petition which has claimed that the chief minister Naveen Patnaik had a role to play in the multi-crore dal scam. Is the CM involved? A letter written by Naveen to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in July 2009 is said to lie at the root of this charge.

In the letter, the chief minister has sought a hike of the price of 'arhar' dal from Rs 36 per kg to Rs 70 per kg, when the market price of the commodity was between Rs 48 and Rs 58 per kg in the state. Later the government went into the damage control mode and restructured the dal procurement process for the mid-day meal scheme. Private contractors were debarred from supplying materials for the scheme and Naveen emerged from all this as clean as ever!

Even more critical and important is the question of mining, both from the centre’s and state’s point of view and given that Orissa as one of the mineral-rich states is home to some of the biggest global investments that this country has seen.

The state government during Naveen’s chief ministership had leased out around 5,000 hectares of mines in the last eight years. Prasad Harichandan, chief whip of the Congress Legislative Party alleges that “Documents brought under the RTI Act showed that over the last six to seven years, more than dozen leading mining and steel companies dug out excessive quantities of iron, chromite and manganese ores in wanton disregard of existing laws. And it’s no secret they could do it due to lax supervision of officials of the Orissa Pollution Control Board, Indian Bureau of Mines, state mines department, forest department, district collector and Ministry of Environment and Forests.”

It has also been claimed that mine owners had used fake transit passes and transported minerals worth thousands of crores from Orissa. The state government has permitted traders to print their own transit passes, resulting in a huge loss of revenue to the government following their unethical uses.

The opposition charge that the chief minister has played a direct role by deliberately creating opportunities for the mining mafia have not washed with the public, who stand firmly behind their leader. As usual, the opposition demand for a CBI inquiry has been ignored by the state government which has shown understandable faith in its own vigilance department which has promptly arrested a few top officials of Directorate of Mines.

Still, the chief minister has come out of this scam unscathed. According to officials, at least seven cases have been registered in the mining scam in which charge-sheets have been filed against 16.

While it is estimated that the loss to public exchequer could be Rs 14,000 crore, the vigilance has detected 2,823 cases of illegal mining and realized Rs 1,673 lakh as penalty! First unearthed in July 2009, the inquiry into this scam is still in progress.

Those who have observed Naveen Patnaik’s career as a chief minister – as well as those who know him well – say, he spares no one when his clean image is at stake, in other words, no stains on spotless white kurta please!

By all accounts, there is a consensus here. Naveen has never hesitated to sack his ministerial colleagues whenever he finds one involved in malpractices.

Neither is this trait new. On July 9, 2001, when Naveen’s ministry was a year old, he sacked three influential cabinet colleagues for alleged involvement in graft. Without any prior information, then ministers Nalinikanta Mohanty (minister for works, housing and parliamentary affairs), Kamala Das (minister for health and family welfare) and Prasanta Nanda (minister of state for rural development and higher education) were asked to resign with immediate effect.

Naveen’s dropping of ministers is no sledgehammer job though – it is usually done with a smile. In his second term, he sacked 12 ministers accused of corruption, irregularity and inefficiency, a record of sorts by one chief minister.

To be sure, he now has a legion of frustrated rivals who are as baffled as the others and spent considerable time trying to dissect the Naveen Patnaik phenomena and longevity.

“Gone are the days when Naveen was intolerant towards corruption. Now he is promoting corruption,” sneers Sivananda Ray, Orissa Congress vice-president, adding: “Everyone in political circles thought that Naveen will drop at least one of his ministers for their alleged involvement in coal scam, which caused a loss of Rs 125 billion to public exchequer.”

During 2005-09, state-owned Orissa Small Industries Corporation (OSIC) had facilitated diversion of subsidised coal to some fake companies.

When this irregularity came to light, opposition parties demanded removal of Badrinarayan Patra, minister of state for urban development and Pratap Jena, minister of mass education for their alleged involvement in the coal scam as this irregularity was found to have taken place during their tenure as chairman of the OSIC.

The state vigilance probed the scam and the government suspended ex-manager of OSIC Srikanta Prusty and some other officials on vigilance report. But the ministers got away as clean as a whistle.

Similarly, the Orissa High Court verdict in the Vedanta University land acquisition case was a huge embarrassment for the state government but unsurprisingly, not for the chief minister.

Hearing a writ petition, a two-member high court bench comprising Chief Justice V. Gopal Gowda and Justice B.P. Das held the acquisition of government land as invalid as it violated Land Acquisition (companies) Rules, 1963.

As the Anil Agarwal Foundation (named after the Vedanta owner) is a company under Section 25 of Companies Act and not a public limited company, the bench ruled that any acquisition of land for it under the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, is illegal.

The irony is supreme here: on one hand though 50,000 inhabitants of 22 odd villages, those who were deprived of their ancestral land and homes and supposed to be displaced, are agitating against the university project, on the other hand the state government has approached the apex court against High Court verdict!

Naveen’s second term was no less scandalous.

• In 2006, a review of the World Bank-sponsored Orissa Health System Development Project (OHSDP) revealed that equipment purchased was hazardous and the civil constructions were below standard.

• In the same year, it came to light that the Orissa Rural Housing Development Corporation (ORHDC), a public enterprise, had disbursed crores of rupees as housing loans to unscrupulous builders and real estate companies, who had produced forged documents for the purpose. According to an estimate, about Rs 1200 crore of public money had been siphoned off.

• In 2007, it was discovered that of Rs 733 crore spent under NREGA (National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) in Orissa during 2006-07, more than Rs 500 crore has been misappropriated by implementing agencies.

Says Panchanan Kanoogo, former finance minister of Orissa: “All scams and financial irregularities done in Naveen’s second term has begun to come out. That will tarnish his so-called clean image. I brand first phase of his rule, 2000 to 2004, as “years of learning” and the second phase, 2004-09, as “years of earning”, the period during which he had finalized all big deals.”

But the BJD leadership is not impressed. Argues Arun Sahoo, chief-whip of BJD legislative party: “How could one blame Naveenji for all those scams and corruptions? His government has created history by winning public mandate for three consecutive terms. Are the voters blind? Naveen has taken stringent action against people involved in corruption.”

According to Congress chief whip Prasad Harichandan, during Naveen Patnaik’s consecutive three terms as chief minister, standards of living of common man has seen a downward trend.

To prove his point, Harichandan says that recently Montek Singh Alhuwalia has written to Naveen Patnaik, conveying his concern over Orissa’s poor growth rate in the agriculture sector. “Orissa’s economy is agro-based and our core is dying. The economy of rural Orissa is drowning but the chief minister still lives with his obsession with mines and industry.” In 2000-01, when Naveen came to power, the per capita consumption rate per month in rural Orissa was Rs. 373.17 while the national rural per capita consumption rate was Rs 486.18. And this after, Naveen Patnaik’s good governance!

Defends Atanu Sabyasachi, Orissa minister of energy: “Our chief minister strongly believes in good governance. When BJD under his leadership came to power in 2000, he had virtually inherited a bankrupt exchequer; at that time Orissa government had to issue overdrafts on all the 365 days of the year. He brought in fiscal discipline. From a revenue deficit state, Orissa has now become a revenue surplus state.”

But there is a consensus across the board: despite being riddled with scams, corruptions and irregularities, the common folk of Orissa still believe in his clean image. Says Ganeswar Mishra, former Editor of The Samaj: “My perception is that, government is a mirror of society.

Therefore, I couldn’t accept a chief minister, who claims complete freedom from corruption. But when the common man is corrupted, the bureaucracy, political leaders, employees and professionals all are corrupted, how could any one clean become an integral part of this system?” Good question to ask, except that no one is doing it where it matters the most.

(With Input from Subrat Dash)