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Odisha whistleblower alleges threat from IAS officer accused of irregularities
Pakal had lodged a complaint before the office of Lokayukta seeking probe against Bishnupada Sethi and alleged that the officer spent ₹9.46 lakh in violation of existing norms.
An Odisha RTI activist has accused a senior IAS officer of threatening to harm him if he didn’t withdraw a complaint alleging officer’s involvement in financial irregularities. The development comes close on the heels of murders of two RTI activists, allegedly over their anti-corruption activism.
In his complaint before the DGP of Odisha Police, RTI activist Srikant Pakal alleged that two people claiming to represent senior IAS officer Bishnupada Sethi asked him twice last month and again this month, to withdraw the case he filed before the Odisha Lokayukta in July last year, against the IAS officer.
“One of his aides, who claimed to be an advocate and a close associate of Sethi, called me and for a discussion on the graft case pending against him. But I turned down his offer. But since then he continued to call me every 5 or 6 days on my mobile phone. When I met him to know his intention, he tried persuading me for a compromise in the case and asked me to stop filing RTI against the government,” Srikant Pakal says in his complaint.
Srikant says another lawyer had met him last month to dole out a threat.
“Last month a person called Ajay Gadnayak claiming to be an advocate met me and threatened me that Bishnupada Sethi is a very influential and powerful person. He can cause any harm to anybody,” Pakal wrote in his complaint to the DGP.
Pakal had lodged a complaint before the office of Lokayukta seeking probe against Bishnupada Sethi and alleged that the officer spent ₹9.46 lakh towards the hospitalisation of his wife and father from the funds of Odisha State Cooperative Bank, in violation of the existing norms during his stint as secretary of cooperation department.
This was the first-ever complaint against an IAS officer after Lokayukta was formed under the Odisha Lokayukta Act, 2014. Citing an inspection report of the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD), the RTI activist alleged in his complaint that Sethi was reimbursed for his actual electricity expenses and orderly allowances at ₹3,000 per month despite the absence of any enabling policy or guideline.
Sethi, who is now secretary of the energy department, however, said he had not threatened anyone but was a victim himself.
“Some activists are trying to frame me in a false case,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Lokayukta has issued notice to state home secretary and the DGP to file their replies in the case of the death of Dalit RTI activist Ranjan Kumar Das of Kendrapara district on January 31 under mysterious circumstances. In his notice, Lokayukta Ajit Singh said the allegations of threats to RTI activists were very serious in nature and if not attended on a priority basis, will dissuade the people of the State from complaining against corrupt public servants.
The notice by the Lokayukata came after the deaths of RTI activists Abhimanyu Panda from Kandhamal and Ranjan Kumar Das of Kendrapara districts. While Panda was shot dead outside his home in December 2019, Das was found dead under mysterious circumstances by a roadside outside his home in Kendrapara district on January 31.
Early this week 18 former civil servants including activist Aruna Roy wrote to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik to bring the Whistle Blowers Protection Act into effect immediately in view of the increasing attacks on RTI activists in Odisha over the years. “When so many RTI activists are killed in any state, it shows that the administrative system and the law and order system is not in control. It appears to us as if the probable reason for his murder arises from an attempt to silence his commitment to highlight corrupt practices. It is a matter of grave concern that activists who use legal and constitutional means to expose criminal acts, among other kinds of corruption are being systematically targeted,” they alleged.