Mr. Arun Jaitley's protest against bankers' arrest unacceptable
Minister Arun Jaitley has protested strongly on the action taken against officials of public sector banks by investigating agencies.
He appears to be unhappy about the officials of Bank of Maharashtra and retired Chairman and Managing Director of Canara Bank being investigated.
Mr. Jaitley is echoing the often repeated threat that the action and arrest of the erring bank officials would make them lose interest in decision making.
The decision making is an essential function of the top managers of the banks and they have to be necessarily accountable for their decisions, as they are handling several crores of rupees of public money.
If they are suspected to have been involved in fraudulent dealings, they need to be investigated and punished severely. After all, they are paid huge salary and other perks and they are not there to sleep over the decisions and avoid functioning effectively.
The argument of Mr. Jaitley that state investigating agencies should not take action against the central government functionaries is absolutely flawed and should be rejected outright. What is wrong if corruption cases are reported to the state government and it acts on the matter?
The argument that even bonafide decisions could be found to be erroneous and therefore , no action should be taken amounts to weaken the investigating agencies. The actions are taken only after establishing that there could be prima facie cases of fraud.
There is absolutely no doubt that several thousands of crores of rupees of loss is incurred by the pubic sector banks due to inefficiency , incompetence and indifference of top managers and the level of corruption that is prevailing and of course political interference.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying his level best to root out corruption in India and has introduced several measures to improve the systems of governance to promote transparency and accountability amongst the officials.
Punishing the corrupt bank officials and showing the door to the incompetent and indifferent ones is absolutely necessary to tone up the administration in public sector banks and restore confidence amongst the public about these institutions.
Mr. Jaitley , a senior minister and holding the finance portfolio until recently and now minister without portfolio due to his illness, should not have made statements criticizing the investigating agencies for catching the fraudsters in the banks, whatever level they belong to in the administration hierarchy of the banks.
Every time when an action is taken against senior officials in any public sector institution by the government, a bogey will be raised that such actions would affect the morale of the employees in the organization and make them reluctant to take decisions. This bogey is a veiled threat to the government to desist from taking actions against erring officials.
It is very important that no one in the government, particularly no minister, should stand in the way of Modi government taking actions against errant officials. The country men are looking upto Mr. Modi to root out corruption in India and would completely support Mr. Modi for any action initiated to put fear in the mind of corrupt officials and root out corruption in India.
Unfortunately, Mr. Jaitley gives an impression that he would not want the investigating agencies to act against the errant officials in the banks.
It is not surprising that SBI Chairman has expressed his happiness about Mr. Arun Jaitley’s statement. While bank officials would be happy about Mr. Arun Jaitley’s statement, the anti corruption crusaders in the country cannot be happy with the views of Mr. Jaitley.
One only hopes that the Prime Minister would advise Mr. Jaitley to exercise caution and sense of responsibility and avoid making such injudicious public statements on such sensitive matters, particularly since this create an impression that Prime Minister’s colleagues are not with him in his anti corruption crusade.
N.S.Venkataraman
Nandini Voice For The Deprived
nandinivoice.com more
He appears to be unhappy about the officials of Bank of Maharashtra and retired Chairman and Managing Director of Canara Bank being investigated.
Mr. Jaitley is echoing the often repeated threat that the action and arrest of the erring bank officials would make them lose interest in decision making.
The decision making is an essential function of the top managers of the banks and they have to be necessarily accountable for their decisions, as they are handling several crores of rupees of public money.
If they are suspected to have been involved in fraudulent dealings, they need to be investigated and punished severely. After all, they are paid huge salary and other perks and they are not there to sleep over the decisions and avoid functioning effectively.
The argument of Mr. Jaitley that state investigating agencies should not take action against the central government functionaries is absolutely flawed and should be rejected outright. What is wrong if corruption cases are reported to the state government and it acts on the matter?
The argument that even bonafide decisions could be found to be erroneous and therefore , no action should be taken amounts to weaken the investigating agencies. The actions are taken only after establishing that there could be prima facie cases of fraud.
There is absolutely no doubt that several thousands of crores of rupees of loss is incurred by the pubic sector banks due to inefficiency , incompetence and indifference of top managers and the level of corruption that is prevailing and of course political interference.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying his level best to root out corruption in India and has introduced several measures to improve the systems of governance to promote transparency and accountability amongst the officials.
Punishing the corrupt bank officials and showing the door to the incompetent and indifferent ones is absolutely necessary to tone up the administration in public sector banks and restore confidence amongst the public about these institutions.
Mr. Jaitley , a senior minister and holding the finance portfolio until recently and now minister without portfolio due to his illness, should not have made statements criticizing the investigating agencies for catching the fraudsters in the banks, whatever level they belong to in the administration hierarchy of the banks.
Every time when an action is taken against senior officials in any public sector institution by the government, a bogey will be raised that such actions would affect the morale of the employees in the organization and make them reluctant to take decisions. This bogey is a veiled threat to the government to desist from taking actions against erring officials.
It is very important that no one in the government, particularly no minister, should stand in the way of Modi government taking actions against errant officials. The country men are looking upto Mr. Modi to root out corruption in India and would completely support Mr. Modi for any action initiated to put fear in the mind of corrupt officials and root out corruption in India.
Unfortunately, Mr. Jaitley gives an impression that he would not want the investigating agencies to act against the errant officials in the banks.
It is not surprising that SBI Chairman has expressed his happiness about Mr. Arun Jaitley’s statement. While bank officials would be happy about Mr. Arun Jaitley’s statement, the anti corruption crusaders in the country cannot be happy with the views of Mr. Jaitley.
One only hopes that the Prime Minister would advise Mr. Jaitley to exercise caution and sense of responsibility and avoid making such injudicious public statements on such sensitive matters, particularly since this create an impression that Prime Minister’s colleagues are not with him in his anti corruption crusade.
N.S.Venkataraman
Nandini Voice For The Deprived
nandinivoice.com more
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The question arises as to why there should not be any action against bankers. The bankers are custodian of public money and are required to be accountable in every respect whether it is frauds or deficiency in system or a nexus operation n hand-in glove with politicians. Why should the Minister cribble for the arrest of the bankers and in fact speaking like this substantiates that the politicians are backing such fraudulent businesses. Yes the officials should fear for any wrong doing and that will make them to respond to the politicians if they ask for some favors. Is he making ground for acquittal of officers in the case of Neerav Modi or Vijay Mallaya etc. more
Jul 05
Efficiency differs from person to person. Just as many PSU officials who came to top positions on the basis of quota power rather than brain power indulged in loot thinking that they would be never investigated. Perhaps a share of the bounty also was passed onto powerful politicians to ensure that the matter is never dug up. Mr.Jaitley also had allegations of misappropriations of funds and misuse of power while officiating as DDCA Chairman but Mr.Kejriwal was stonewalled in the court proceedings with even Courts blatantly siding with Finance Minister and disallowing Kejriwal's request for perusal of DDCA records. Ultimately Mr.Kerjriwal was forced to back down. Why Top Bank Officials alone even Judicial high priests are not averse to greed for wealth. Ex CJI Balakrishnan had case of inappropriate wealth lodged against him but the same was latter found to be in the name of his Son-In-Law. So it is all in the family. more
Jul 05
Such kind of statements give very negative message in public. It shows the biased mind set. Every corrupted person irrelevant of the position & authority must be investigated if there is serious allegation more
Jul 05
POLITICAL INTERVENTIONS IN POLICING , JUDICIARY AND, Governance need to be eradicated to have real Governance under Constitutional Mandates and IPC. more
Jul 05
