A blot on Shivraj

A DEMOCRACY must not tolerate an incompetent government. Indian politicians insist on exercising their right to govern, but are most reluctant to take responsibility for their follies. Ever since the Bofors scandal, scams have increasingly become part of our political landscape. We have also devised a standard operating procedure to avoid any accountability — the political person in power constitutes a special investigative team, then a judicial probe is conceded and finally, the matter gets referred to the CBI. After years of shoddy and indifferent probe, investigators would produce some innocuous and small-time operatives. The resourceful mastermind remains elusive.  That spells Vyapam.

Scams like Vyapam, cannot take place without direct or indirect political and administrative patronage. The CBI has now chargesheeted 592 persons, mostly insignificant front-desk operators, in the five-year-old corruption case. It has also exposed the “engine-bogie” modus operandi of the examination racket where bribe-givers copied answer-sheets of hired bright students called ‘solvers’ to qualify in the medical entrance test for Madhya Pradesh colleges. These accused had also manipulated government’s quota in private institutions to secure seats for students who did not even appear in the entrance test. These interesting theories of the central investigating agency seem plausible. It is also to be noted that chairmen of three private medical colleges have been chargesheeted. This would certainly deter other such private institutions from making quick money. And, what a sorry tale this scam tells of the state of our education, in our supposedly well-run states.

It is inconceivable that a director and some junior-level officials can carry out on their own a scam of this magnitude. More than 40 mysterious deaths have totted up during the investigation. Senior secretary-level IAS officials and their minister bosses, who have been responsible to run the Vyavsayik Pariksha Mandal (Vyapam), rechristened as Professional Examination Board, remain untouched. The political leadership cannot pretend to be unconcerned, uninvolved and unanswerable. Vyapam is a glaring case of gross political incompetence and criminal misgovernance, masquerading as su-shasan.