Are moves afloat to keep on deferring and holding off the much hyped exercise of conducting “High Level” inquiry with an intention to manipulate and dilute the violations of norms and procedures in respect of appointments made in Jammu and Kashmir Khadi Village and Industries Board (KVIB). If it is not so and our such fears are not congruent with the circumstantial developments, how it can be explained that for the third deadline given, one after the other in a row, not being “sufficient enough” to enable the high level enquiry panel to complete the enquiry , identify the culpable officials and submit the report so that action under rules could be taken against them.
‘Excelsior’ has been regularly reporting the developments in this scam and having made it abundantly clear to follow the matter vigorously till a stern action against the guilty was taken especially in our report dated October 1, 2018 where we had explicitly made it known that there were bleak chances of the enquiry panel meeting the deadline of Oct 31 because of the dilly dallying approach since the ordering of conducting the enquiry. Our stand is vindicated but in pursuit of our commitment to follow up the case, we feel appalled like most of our readers, in learning that the ‘High Level’ enquiry panel has not completed the enquiry even after eight months and deadlines for the same extended thrice.
It may be recalled that the allegations of appointments made in the J&K KVIB in favour of close relatives of the leaders of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in blatant violations of the norms and fair play having surfaced, were decided to be investigated by the committee of the top bureaucrats of the State Government. PDP was running the Government in coalition with the BJP in the State when this scam took place. Initially, the proverbial ‘mole in thief’s beard’ perhaps operated as the then coalition Government initially maintained criminal silence over the controversial selections but a lot of hue and cry by the opposition parties as also from the deserving and meritorious candidates compelled the Government to order an enquiry asking the panel to complete the entire exercise and submit the report within one month but more than eight months have passed and despite three deadlines having lavishly been granted, nothing is heard in respect of the matter.
There is no word about the necessary documents pertaining to the scam having at least been seized by the high powered enquiry panel in order to circumvent any scope of tampering with them or altering them to mislead the enquiry process mandated to enquire into the causes, reasons, procedures, modus operandi etc adopted for making alleged unfair selections for appointments as also the methodology employed in selection of the agency for setting the question papers and evaluation processes and whether any deviations took place right from advertising the posts down to “selecting” the candidates. The time is ripe for the Governor’s Administration to take a call very seriously in the matter and arrange the enquiry to be completed as early as possible so that the guilty were punished suitably.
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