THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB) has revised its data bank on suspected corrupt government servants, adding 665 new names to it, taking the total number to 1,365. The vigilance repository last year had around 700 names.
The number began increasing this year following enhanced surveillance and intelligence gathering from the field to complement ‘Operation Zero’ -- a special drive launched by the home minister against institutional corruption.
Of the 1,365 names, 869 have been flagged as ‘Officers of Dubious Integrity’ (ODI). The ODIs are those individuals who had faced graft-related investigation in the past but managed to emerge unscathed due to administrative issues or legal loopholes.
VACB sources told the TNIE that officials with the departments of local self-government, revenue, motor vehicle, geology and forest feature prominently in the list. The vigilance relies on this particular data bank while planning special drives and even trap operations, a source said. The list is primarily prepared on the basis of information gleaned from the public, who have a strong aversion to tainted officers.
“There are citizens who are a disgruntled lot as they were denied services for not paying kickbacks. They are the ones who primarily report about corrupt officials. We then mount surveillance on such officers and confirm whether the allegations against them are true,” said a vigilance source. VACB sleuths also employ digital methods to ascertain the allegations before planning operations against such elements.
According to the source, 23 government servants have been caught in trap operations this year and many of the cases had their genesis from the data bank. A senior officer verified this aspect and said the vigilance regularly approaches individuals turned away by the corrupt officials after they declined to pay bribe, and asked them to cooperate with trap operations.
“Once we confirm that they were unjustly denied a government service, we approach them and collect information as to what had gone wrong. Many of them agree to cooperate with us in mounting trap operations,” the officer added.
Wary of being caught red-handed, the corrupt officers are now inclined to take bribe indirectly and deploy agents to collect money on their behalf. Sources said this was more evident in the case of the Motor Vehicle Department, where corrupt officials take the help of agents to collect and distribute money for the services rendered. In such cases, the VACB found that agents mostly swarm MVD offices on Friday evenings before the offices down their shutters.
Such offices the agents frequented on Friday afternoons were specifically watched and it was confirmed that they came there to hand over the cash collected. Those offices and officers were included in the list. However, the VACB officials failed to get to the corrupt elements in departments such as PWD and the Kerala Water Authority, where corruption is layered, deep and embedded.