Honest officers need not fear CBI, CAG: CVC

Honest officers need not worry about CBI or CAG as genuine errors are differentiated from deliberate ones while deciding corruption cases, Vigilance Commissioner in CVC, T M Bhasin said here today.
He said the Commission has also introduced a procedure to check malafide complaints of alleged corruption, which usually surge against an officer when he or she is being considered for a high-level appointment, by asking the complainants to "own it up" first.
Bhasin said the anti-corruption watchdog is also taking measures to speed up the pending corruption cases.
"Honest bureaucrats need not fear CAG, CBI or CVC. The Commission looks into the complaints of corruption in a very judicious manner. Any file that comes to us, we find vigilance or non-vigilance angle in it and only in vigilance cases we proceed with punishment," he told PTI in an interview.

Bhasin, a former Chairman and Managing Director of Indian Bank, said there is no "witch hunting".
"Wherever we see a corruption case, we refer it to the CBI for probe. There is no witch hunting," the Vigilance Commissioner said.

He said the Commission checks malafide complaints against certain bureaucrats when they are being considered for some appointments.
"Only anonymous complaints are filed. In case of verifiable allegations in pseudonymous and other complaints, we first send it to the complainant to own it up.
"In most of the cases, our letters return as the complainants usually give wrong address or information to misguide us or to delay vigilance clearance to a bureaucrat which is necessary for being considered for a post, appointment or empanelment. We are following a differential approach in all these cases," Bhasin said.

The Chief Vigilance Officers (CVOs), who act as distant arms of the CVC, have also been following a very careful approach while deciding on corruption cases, he said.
The Commission, he said, is also taking steps to check delay in finalising corruption cases. "We are in the process of making a data bank of pending cases. We have asked our CVOs to prepare this data and wherever possible expedite pending corruption cases. There are vigilance cases as old as 10-15 years. We are meeting CVOs of all organisations one by one," Bhasin said.