Chauhan plays politics on wheat procurement

Shivraj Singh Chauhan has a genius for converting everything into a profitable racket and then obstreperously blame the Congress-led UPA government for ignoring the interests of Madhya Pradesh. The IAS officers help obsequiously in his machinations. The procurement of wheat is a case in point.

Long before the current procurement season started, the chief minister had started proclaiming that the government was fully equipped to purchase all the wheat that came to the mandis and that no farmer would have to wait. The situation was now and then reviewed by the chief minister and chief secretary Avani Vaish as well as other officials concerned and the arrangements were found satisfactory.

The State government's vast network of officials connected with agricultural production had estimated that around 65 lakh tonnes of wheat would be available for purchase by the government agencies. The government needed 2.8 lakh bales of gunny bags for the purpose. However, the State government asked the Centre in November last year to arrange for it only 1.44 lakh bales and  stated that the State would arrange on its own the remaining 1.44 lakh bales needed, which it did not do.

In April when the farmers were out with their produce at the mandis (which are managed by the bureaucracy as the government has not held the mandi elections for quite some time), the chief minister started making distress calls to the Centre for immediately dispatching to the State the gunny bags and even threatened to sit on a dharna, along with the BJP MPs, in front of Parliament House in Delhi to highlight the anti-farmer attitude of the UPA government. The State government also raised the estimate of the wheat arrival in the mandis from the earlier 65 lakh tonnes to 80 lakh tonnes.

Chauhan's enthusiasm for holding a demonstration against the UPA government in Delhi was somewhat checked when Union Food Minister K V Thomas wrote to the chief minister calling his bluff and the State Congress led by Kantilal Bhuria announced a programme of State-wide agitation to expose Shivraj Singh Chauhan's mischief. Thomas said in his letter that planning for purchase of bags by the Madhya Pradesh government was not accurate and it increased its initial projected requirement of 1.44 lakh bales of bags to be purchased from the Directorate General of Supplies & Disposals to 3.19 lakh bales. The supply of jute bags was bound to be affected in the State as the Madhya Pradesh government revised its requirement of jute bags frequently, while other States like Punjab and Haryana had firm planning in November 2011 itself, he said. Thomas added, “It may be impressed upon the State officials concerned to properly plan for their jute bag requirements in future in a more realistic manner.”

Chauhan has been doing it with specific objectives in mind, according to those who have been keenly watching his wheat politics. First, he and his chief secretary and other officials invite the farmers with the firm assurance that they would not have to wait for selling their produce in the mandis. Initially the procurement goes smoothly. Then the chief minister announces that there are no bags because the Centre has not supplied these and the procurement stops. The farmers are not in a position to wait indefinitely or take the produce back and store it (where?). They start making distress sale to private traders for Rs 800-900 per quintal whereas the minimum support price (MSP) for wheat has been fixed at Rs 1365 in Madhya Pradesh. Who the beneficiary private traders are is anybody's guess.

By the time the bags start arriving in the State, many of the farmers have made distress sale of their produce. In anticipation of this, Chauhan has already increased the figure of estimated wheat production this year from 65 lakh tonnes to 80 lakh tonnes. In all probability, this "increase" is phoney. Some of the wheat purchased in distress sale for Rs 800-900 per quintal is expected to flow back to the government purchase centres where it would fetch a price of Rs 1365 per quintal. A neat game of hundreds of crores of rupees within a few days!

Besides, some "trusted farmers" from the neighbouring States may be ready with their wheat to sell at the government purchase centres in Madhya Pradesh because here they would get more for their produce. The Madhya Pradesh government is paying a bonus of Rs 100 over and above the minimum support price (MSP) of Rs 1285 fixed by the Centre. How this is done was explained by Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Ajay Singh in July last year by issuing a well-prepared "black paper" on the State government's wheat procurement policy. Some examples:The government had declared Chhatarpur and Tikamgarh districts as drought-affected but lakhs of tonnes of wheat was procured from there. The government procured more than 800 quintals of wheat from a canteen owner in Harda, Gvond Moolaji, though he owned only around ten acres of land. The recorded yield in the district is around 20 quintals of wheat per acre.The caretaker of the Civil Supplies Corporation godown at Ashoknagar had refused to accept 500 quintals of wheat as he had found that it was from the previous season. The sample tests had also shown it to be old. Wheat purchased from Uttar Pradesh was shown as having been purchased from the local farmers in Pichhor and Khaniadhana tehsils of Shivpuri district.The “black paper” listed instances of large scale bungling in weighing and transport also.

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Shehla Masood murder: the new 'bribery' angle

The CBI, entrusted with the task of solving the Shehla Masood murder case, has woven a web around itself; it will be some time before it can be seen coming out of it, if it can really come out of it. At present, the agency is investigating the allegation of bribery against its investigating team.

The allegation was levelled by Sabah Farooqui who was an aide of interior designer Zahida Parvez, considered by the CBI till some time back as the main culprit; the CBI officers had been claiming that she had confessed her crime with full operational details. Both Zahida and Sabah are in judicial custody and lodged in an Indore jail.

Shehla Masood, in her late thirties, was found shot dead in her car around 11 in the morning of August 16 last year. A vibrant RTI activist and supporter of Anna Hazare’s campaign against corruption, she was galvanised by the news of Hazare’s arrest in Delhi that morning and had planned, along with fellow RTI activists, a signature campaign at the Boat Club at 2 pm in support of Anna Hazare.

Four days later the case was entrusted to the CBI for investigation.

Zahida has recorded her statement under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure in which she was said to have denied any role in the murder of Shehla Masood. Sabah has not yet made up her mind about recording her statement.

However, Zahida and Sabah had "told" the media persons that Dhruv Narayan Singh was the mastermind behind Shehla's murder. Singh is a BJP MLA and was chairman of the Madhya Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation (MPTDC) till May last year. The CBI has grilled him and searched his residences a number of times and also conducted a polygraph test on him. Singh was also a vice-president of the State BJP and was removed from that post after the CBI started questioning him in connection with the Shehla Masood murder case.

The CBI has made a big issue of the "intimate relations" between Dhruv Narayan Singh and Zahida Parvez which they have not denied. Beyond that, the CBI does not have found any evidence to link Singh with the crime --- at least so far.

Curiously, Zahida and Sabah did not name Singh in the court when they were produced for extension of their judicial remand. It was only when they were being taken back to the jail that media persons asked them about the culprit and they named Singh as the mastermind -- first Zahida and then Sabah a day later. Sabah also added that the CBI officers had taken money from Singh and that was why they were not arresting him.

The CBI bosses in Delhi, it seems, were disturbed. They promptly despatched Assistant Superintendent T Rajah Balaji to Bhopal to ascertain the veracity of Sabah's allegation and if there really is substantial evidence against Dhruv Narayan Singh and the investigators were not arresting him for monetary considerations.

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Rohani's duplicity in Parulekar's case

The manner in which Congress MLA Kalpana Parulekar has been arrested and jailed does little credit to the police, the government and the judiciary in Madhya Pradesh. It also exposes once again the duplicity of Assembly Speaker Ishwardas Rohani who has brought disgrace to the House many times by his partisan behaviour.

Parulekar's offence is not such that the courts should repeatedly refuse bail to her. The police, which was once described by a judge of the Madhya Pradesh High Court as the "criminal force in uniform", has not so far explained how Parulekar has come to be treated as the main and only accused.

One afternoon in early February, the CID officers had swooped on the house of Parulekar at Mahidpur in Ujjain district, arrested her, brought her to Bhopal and produced her at the residence of a judicial magistrate in the night. The magistrate remanded her to judicial custody. The sessions court had refused to reverse the judicial magistrate's order.

Parulekar had, for all that is known, distributed in the House and then at the Assembly press room during the last session towards the end of November a photograph showing Madhya Pradesh Lokayukta Prakash Prabhakar Naolekar in the RSS uniform. Naolekar claimed that the photograph was morphed; the police registered an FIR and entrusted the case to the CID “for investigation”.

Who did the police or CID get the offending photograph from? Surely, it was not from Parulekar. Why has the person, from whose possession the photograph was recovered by the police, not been made an accused? If someone took the photograph to the police to lodge a complaint that his feelings had been hurt by seeing Lokayukta Naolekar in RSS uniform, why did not the police reveal the name of the complainant and the nature of his grievance? Why does the police keep the FIR a closely guarded secret? Then regrettably, how did the judges allow themselves to become party to this dirty game of chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Lokayukta Naolekar? These are some of the questions which Parulekar's incarceration has thrown up.

The matter of Parulekar's arrest and incarceration was vigorously raised in the Assembly by Congress members on Wednesday, the first day of the budget session, when Arif Aquil sought a discussion on his notice of breach of privilege because the police had violated the sanctity of the House by arresting the MLA without the consent of the Speaker. He was supported by other members of the party. The Speaker guiltily looked to minister of legislative affairs Narottam Mishra who pronounced that Parulekar had committed a crime and had accordingly been arrested and jailed. Moreover, he said, the matter was sub judice. (Does a matter become sub judice simply because someone has been arrested and jailed while no investigation has been completed and no charge sheet presented?)

Deputy Leader of Opposition Chaudhary Rakesh Singh Chaturvedi even quoted M N Kaul and S L Shakdher, authorities on parliamentary practices, to point out that the entire premises formed part of the House and a member having done something on the premises could not be arrested without first seeking permission from the Speaker. Rohani was not impressed. He, however, got the escape route as dictated by Narottam Mishra and refused a discussion and, following the uproar that ensued, adjourned the House for the day.

Rohani, facing allegations of having acquired properties worth over Rs 300 crore in Jabalpur, shows concern for his authority only if it suits his interest. When a former Lokayukta had initiated investigation of a complaint of financial irregularities by two Assembly secretariat officials, Rohani lost no time in sending a notice of breach of privilege to the Lokayukta and five officials of the Lokayukta Organisation who had helped the Lokayukta in the preliminary investigation.

Rohani had received support for his stand from Yagya Dutt Sharma, who was Speaker during the Arjun Singh regime but had later joined the BJP. His view was that registration of a case against two officials of the Assembly Secretariat and service of notices on them by the Lokayukta amounted to challenging the rights of the Speaker. The Assembly and the staff working there are under the jurisdiction of the Speaker and the Lokayukta had encroached upon the rights of the Speaker by starting action against the officials without the Speaker’s permission. Another former Speaker, Shrinivas Tiwari, had felt that the staff working in the Assembly secretariat did not enjoy the privilege. It was a different matter in the case of Speaker and members.

The Lokayukta, too, had quoted from the “Practice and Procedure of Parliament” by M N Kaul and S L Shakdher to point out that the privileges of Parliament are granted to members only so that they may be able to perform their duties in Parliament without let or hindrance.

What Parulekar did was on the Assembly premises. Speaker Rohani, who remembered his jurisdiction and authority in the case of Assembly secretariat employees, is looking the other way in the case of a member. A fine instance of duplicity of a person holding constitutional position!

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