Brilliant Babus

Killing two birds with one stone is an art that has been perfected by some of the intelligent officers of the Himalayan State. A perfect example was witnessed recently in the State Cabinet’s decision of imposing a blanket ban on stone crushers within three kms of rivers. It is clear that the State Government was under pressure from the green lobby and various orders of the courts to act against the stone crushers which in recent years have impregnated the landscape of the State and were causing irreparable environmental damage. In the amended Act, the officials apart from banning these units located within three kms of the rivers also came out with an ingenious idea of giving licences to the mobile stone crushers. There would be no distance from the river criteria for these units and in sync with ease of doing business notion, the District Magistrates have been authorised to issue licences for these units for a period of one year. Kudos for the brilliant Babus!

Power play

Call it fear or awe generated by a Babu on the officers and employees of the department he till recently lorded over that they are still hesitant to report his arrest to the Government. This Babu, a joint director in the social welfare department, was arrested by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) constituted to investigate the multi-crore scholarship scam and sent on 14 days’ Judicial Custody by the court. In normal practice, a Government employee has to be suspended within two days of his arrest in any criminal case. However, this Babu, having powerful connections, is no ordinary employee. Quite interestingly, the top officials of State administration are now pointing fingers at the directorate which according to them has not informed them about his arrest while the officials of the directorate are finding refuge in the statement that the SIT has not told them about arrest of the officer. This technically means that the State administration is not aware about the open fact that one of its officers is under arrest for last 14 days. Sounds strange? But it is true.

Aadhaar ordeal

Apparently frustrated by the system’s labyrinthine approach on a simple thing such as making an Aadhaar card, an individual made a call on the mobile number of the Chief Minister and when one of his personal staff picked it, threatened to bomb Har Ki Paidi in Haridwar. Made in the aftermath of the Supreme Court verdict in the Ram Janmabhoomi case, the threat sent the police and intelligence setup of the state into tizzy. When this person was eventually traced and arrested, he revealed that he was under duress because he is not able to make his Aadhaar card from last many years. Interestingly, this man was arrested for making a threatening call to former Chief Minister Harish Rawat also and for this precise problem of his. Perturbed by the dangerous habit of the individual, one very senior police officer gave orders to his subordinates that they should ensure that the man gets his Aadhaar card.