RTI to probe CBI's closure of HUDCO scam

The Right To Information (RTI) Act may help unveil the mystery behind the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) proposing and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) disposing in the Rs 1,300 crore HUDCO scam. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: May 7, 2011, 19:01:29 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The Right To Information (RTI) Act may help unveil the mystery behind the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) proposing and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) disposing in the Rs 1,300 crore HUDCO scam.

The Central Information Commission (CIC) this week directed the CBI to provide its inquiry report on closing investigation in four cases, where the CVC had found “adequate evidence of paying bribes” to mobilize funds from the Housing and Urban Development Corporation (HUDCO) in 2006.

The CBI closed the case saying there was inadequate evidence to take the investigations further. Its view had resulted in the housing and urban development ministry submitting a closure report in Supreme Court in 2007.

The corporation had invested Rs 950 crore in West Bengal Infrastructure Development Finance, Rs 200 crore in Himachal Pradesh Infrastructure Development Board and Rs 150 crore in Vidharbha Irrigation Development Corporation and there were allegations of bribery to get funds from HUDCO.

“It appears that CVC found clear evidence showing bribes have been taken. However, the CBI and the (Housing and Urban Development) ministry have come to the conclusion there is no wrong doing. If the corruption is to be curtailed and the government and its instrumentalities are to be held accountable, citizens need to get information of this nature,” information commissioner Shailesh Gandhi said.

The CBI’s information officer Pradeep Kumar had refused to provide information to RTI applicant A N Gupta of Noida, on the grounds that the investigation report was privileged and confidential and hence exempted from disclosure. The investigations were closed in 2007 and the Supreme Court was informed about it.

Gandhi said the information officer had wrongly applied the exemption clauses, saying that “mere fears without any justification cannot be a ground for denying the citizen’s fundamental right. The commission also said the Kumar had failed to justify reasons for denying information as stipulated in the Right To Information Act.

“The commission has come to the conclusion that none of the exemptions would apply to the information sought by the appellant. Even if the exemptions apply, this is a fit case where larger public interest would outweigh the harm to any protected interest,” the order issued on Friday said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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