Whistleblowers have no legal protection in India

THE TIMES OF INDIA, BANGALORE
MONDAY, MARCH 29, 2010
TIMES NATION
NATION MAILBOX
MY TIMES, MY VOICE
Imperative measure by DGCA
The DGCA’s move to bring in certain rules to curb
disturbingly growing trend of unruly behaviour by air
passengers with a year in jail and a fine of Rs 5 lakh is an
imperative measure albeit a delayed one. Increasing
incidents suggests that in the absence of such stringent
measures, many of the culprits go scot-free, leaving the
air hostesses harassed and emotionally outraged apart
from risking the lives of passengers. Some incidents
reported earlier also involved arrogant politicians and
other high profile people. The proposed rule will definitely
extend protection to cabin crew and passengers.
M V Krishna, VIA EMAIL
Our netas should learn from US
US President Obama has managed to get the US health
reforms Bill passed. Definitely a feather in his cap. It will
benefit millions of Americans across the society, without
discrimination of gender, age or caste. He is reported to
have taken the opinion of the citizens. Let us hope the
Indian political honchos take a leaf of this and learn to
take development and reforms to all levels, not a select
section of the society.
G Padmanabhan, VIA EMAIL
Apologize to the nation
It is shocking to read the report that Delhi has been shown
in Pakistan in the Railway map in an advertisement for the
inauguration of Union Railway Ministers dream project. It
is strange that such a serious lapse has gone unnoticed.
The authorities responsible for issuing the advertisement
owe an apology to the nation.
K V Seetharamaiah, VIA EMAIL
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13
Whistleblowers have no
legal protection in India
What is a whistleblower protection law?
A whistleblower is
defined as someone
who exposes wrongdoing, fraud, corruption or mismanagement. In many
cases, this could be
a person who works
for the government
who would report
misconduct within
the government or it could an employee of a private company who reports corrupt practices within the
company. The law that governments
enact to protect such persons who
help to expose corruption is called a
whistleblower protection law.
Does India have a whistleblower
protection law?
No, at present India does not have any
law to protect whistleblowers, though
a Bill to do so is in the pipeline. The
issue of protection for whistleblowers caught the attention of the entire
country when National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) engineer
Satyendra Dubey was killed after he
wrote a letter to the office of Prime
Minister A B Vajpayee detailing corruption in the construction of highways. In the letter, he had asked
specifically that his identity be kept
NHAI engineer Satyendra Dubey —
the young whistleblower who had
exposed corruption in the Golden
Quadrilateral highway project in
Bihar, in 2003
secret. Instead, the letter was forwarded to various concerned departments without masking Dubeys
identity. Dubeys murder led to a public outcry at the failure to protect him.
As a result, in April 2004, the Supreme
Court pressurised the Government
into issuing an office order the Public Interest Disclosures and Protection of Informers Resolution, 2004
designating the CVC as the nodal
agency to handle complaints on corruption. However, over a year later
Manjunath Shanmugham, an IIM
graduate and a sales manager of the
Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), was
murdered on November 19, 2005 for
exposing the racket of adulteration
of petrol and the mafia behind it.
What is the proposed law?
The Public Interest Disclosure (Protection of Informers) Bill, 2009 was
prepared by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT). As per
the draft law, any person can make a
complaint of corruption or disclosure
against any central government employee or central government-backed
institution to the Central Vigilance
Commission (CVC). The CVC, which
would be designated as the competent
authority for complaints, would have
the powers of a civil court, including
powers to summon anybody, order police investigation and provide security to the whistleblower. The CVC
would not reveal the identity of the
complainant but would have the authority to ignore complaints of vexatious or frivolous nature.
Do other countries have similar
laws to protect whistleblowers?
Several countries have already put
in place laws to protect whistleblowers or are in the process of doing so.
However, the level of protection and
the way in which the law operates differs from country to country. For instance, the US was one of the earliest to have the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989 while the UK has
the Public Interest Disclosure Act of
1998 and Norway has a similar law in
place since January 2007.
MoD flounders on Security breach at IGI again
houses for jawans
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Only 42,000 units
of 2 lakh approved
built in 8 Years
Rajat Pandit | TNN
New Delhi: Leave alone supersonic
fighter jets or complex ballistic missile defence systems, the defence
establishment seems incapable of
even providing something as basic
as decent family accommodation to its armed forces.
Even as the defence
ministry (MoD) flounders, deadlines after
deadlines of the
much-touted married
accommodation project (MAP), touted as a
major welfare measure
for soldiers, airmen and
sailors, are being missed
with huge cost escalations.
Consequently, while officers
have it relatively easy, the majority of jawans are forced to stay away
from their families for prolonged
periods, which is one of the factors
cited for the high levels of mental
stress prevalent in the forces. Incidentally, the 13-lakh strong armed
forces record over 120 suicide and
‘fragging’ cases every year.
MAP was conceived a decade ago
to ameliorate some of the hardships
faced by jawans since there was lim-
V
ited housing available for married
personnel. Though the aim was to
construct just 198,881 new dwelling
units, in four phases at an estimated cost of Rs 17,357 crore, it was considered to be a good beginning.
But it has flattered to deceive.
In May 2002, the Cabinet Committee on Security approved construction of 61,658 dwelling units
under Phase-I, which were to be
finished by 2005-2006.
Eight years later, even after the
number of units to be constructed was reduced to
58,391 in 86 military
stations at a cost of
Rs 5,329 crore, PhaseI is yet to be completed. “Only about
42,000 units are
ready till now,’’ said
an official.
“The less said about
Phase-II the better. Under it,
66,727 units have to be constructed in a compressed timeframe by
March 2012. It will simply not be
possible,’’ he said. MoD, on its part,
says Phase-II will not be branched
off to PSUs, like it was done in
Phase-I. Defence minister A K
Antony has ‘directed’ senior officials to ensure ‘strict adherence’
to the March 2012 deadline. Given
the track record of MAP and MES,
the timely execution of Phase-II,
at a cost of Rs 9,938 crore, is likely to remain a mere pipedream.
O
New Delhi: A 65-year-old man
scaled a gate at IGI airport and
entered the premises on Saturday night, apparently in a bid to
make it to Haj — the second such
security worry in just 18 hours
and the third so far this year.
CISF personnel nabbed Fazl
Mohammad the moment he
jumped off the gate, into the restricted zone. The breach came
just hours after a 28-year-old
man was arrested as he sneaked
into the apron area and tried to
board a flight to Dubai.
The CISF ordered a high-level inquiry into the security
arrangements at the airport. Additional DG (CISF) and senior
officials of the Bureau of Civil
Aviation Security visited the air-
CAUSE FOR CONCERN
port on Sunday morning to assess the situation. Officials revealed that the matter had been
taken up very seriously and action would be taken to fix any
loopholes in the security apparatus and against any personnel at fault within 48 hours.
India Infrastructure
Finance Company Limited
Expressions of Interest
IIFCL ,a wholly owned Government of India Company, is engaged
in promoting development of infrastructure, through the PublicPrivate-Partnership (PPP) model and is availing loans from
multilateral and bilateral institutions for funding the projects .
IIFCL PROPOSES TO ENGAGE A A
CONSULTING FIRM FOR
‘REVIEW , DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF AN
INTEGRATED RISK MANAGEMENT SYSTEM FOR INDIA
INFRASTRUCTURE FINANCE COMPANY LIMITED (IIFCL)’.
Detailed EOl is available on the company ’s website
www.iifcl.org. Interested consultants must provide
information
indicating
that they are qualified to perform the
services (brochures , description of similar assignments,
experience in similarconditions , availabi lityof appropriate skills
among staff , etc .) . Consultants may associate to enhance their
qualifications. Expressions of Interest must be delivered to
Mr Sanjeev Kumar , Asst Manager , India Infrastructure
Finance Company Ltd., Jeevan Prakash Building, 10th Floor ,
K.G. Marg, New Delhi —110001 latest by l5 th Apr iI , 2010.
Chief General Manager
The issue has become a great
worry, given the nature of the
four intrusions in the past few
years where the accused have
been mentally unstable, inebriated or old. “If such people have
found it easy to enter the airport,
we shudder to think of what
would happen were a meticulously planned attack to take
place,’’ said airport sources.
Sources said patrolling had
been beefed up at the peripheral
wall while police had been alerted. Sources said a perimeter intrusion detection system was
likely to be in place by April 30.
Abhishek blipped out,
Big B sees a pattern
being displayed. I wonder why?” the actor commented on his blog on Sunday.
Mumbai: An upset Amitabh Bachchan
Dixit has reportedly said that she is
on Sunday said he was hurt after son not aware of anything. But the actor
Abhishek’s video for the Earth Day writes, “Abhishek has been appointed
campaign in Delhi was pulled out at the WWF ambassador for Earth Day, a
the last moment. The clip was to be campaign that has been initiated by
shown at the India Gate on Saturday WWF for preservation of the Earth.
in the presence of
Many ads have
chief
minister
been announcing,
Sheila Dixit.
with his photo“An audio-visugraph in place, that
al has been preon March 27 let the
pared with Abentire country obhishek where he is
serve a simple rituseeking a pledge toal of putting off
wards preservation
electricity in their
of the Earth and rehomes from 8.30 pm
questing people to BACHCHANS IN A SPOT: Amitabh, Abhishek to 9.30 pm,” he said.
switch off their
lights for an hour. Chief minister of Del- BJP CALLS CONG FASCIST
hi, Mrs Shiela Dixit, and a prominent New Delhi: With a virtual war havmember of the ruling Congress Party, ing started between Congress and the
is attending the moment. A few hours Amitabh Bachchan family, Opposition
before the show was to start apparent- BJP on Sunday accused the Congress
ly the audio visual featuring Abhishek of being “fascist”, claiming workers
has been asked to be removed and ban- of the ruling party had forcibly rener posters bearing his photograph as moved posters of actor Abhishek
Ambassador have been stopped from Bachchan at a function in Delhi. TNN
Bharati Dubey | TNN
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA
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