Elite babus abscond; Centre, States clueless about missing cadre
This Indian mystery can easily make part of an episode on Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Almost 19 officers of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and two of the Indian Police Service (IPS) belonging to various State cadres have been missing for ages and shockingly, neither the Centre nor the States have any clue about their whereabouts.
Most of these civil servants went abroad on study leave or some official assignments and never returned. Although it requires painstaking efforts to get into the hallowed cadre, but once there, it seems that a recruit can choose not to attend office for several years! Apparently, he or she can calmly go on a foreign jaunt, join a private sector bank, or simply go incommunicado! What is even more baffling is the fact that the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and State Government are just clueless about the whereabouts of the officers who have been untraceable for years.
The officers who are missing include Namita Dutta (AGMUT, 1991), Amit Kumar Jain (Sikkim, 1991), Sanjay Agarwal (Maharashtra, 1996), Jyotsna Verma (Jharkhand, 1992), KC Mishra (Bihar, 1977), Prashant (West Bengal, 1988), lV Nilesh (Maharashtra, 1991), lV Prasad (AGMUT cadre IPS 1997) Puneet Arora (AGMUT cadre IPS 1997), Shishir Priyadarshi (UP, 1980), Atul Bagai (UP, 1983), Rita Singh (UP, 1997), Alok Khare (Assam-Meghalaya, 1992), Rahul Anand (Himachal Pradesh, 1996), Amitabh Mukherjee (West Bengal, 1983), Saroj Kumar Jha (Odisha, 1990), Cherry Malik (Bihar, 2004), AK Tiwari (Maharashtra, 1990), Raj Kamal (Karnataka, 1989) and Sanjay Bhatia (UP 1990), Anil Yadav (MP, 1999).
Despite the fact these officers have gone on unauthorised leave for several years, no action has been initiated against them by the competent authority. The authorities have failed to initiate any penal action against these truant bureaucrats. This flies in the face of the administrative reforms that the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has initiated.
The unmistakable irony is that their records are dutifully maintained by the DoPT under the PMO but nobody knows where they are. They have neither been debarred from Central deputation nor can they be denied permission to rejoin active duty when they turn up after several years of ‘self-induced coma’, said a top official pleading anonymity.
Significantly, the DoPT has recently written to all the State Governments asking them to update it about the current status of these officials.
“The DoPT wants the State Governments to provide it with the compete details of the current stations of these missing officials. It also wants to know what steps were taken to get them back to the cadre,” sources in the DoPT said.
According to DoPT officials, Namita Datta, a 1991 batch officer of AGMUT, had gone missing since 2006. She had gone to join the United Nations on an assignment as Governance Advisor, World Bank Washington but never returned.
She had worked in the capacity of Joint Secretary (Home) with the Delhi Government, Additional Secretary to lieutenant-Governor. Considered to be a very bright officer, she is untraceable now. Even her batchmates cannot recollect her last appearance.
Take the case of Amit Kumar Jain, who belongs to the Sikkim cadre of the IAS 1991 batch, but has been missing from his job since 2003. Shockingly, even after ten years, no action has been taken against him. His record sheet simply states, ‘Absent since 2003’. Alok Khare of the 1992 Assam-Meghalaya cadre has been absent since 2009 and his record sheet is more or less on the same lines as that of Amit Kumar Jain.
The case of Shishir Priyadarshi, a 1980 batch IAS officer is even more interesting. He left on a foreign posting and despite the expiry of his tenure of posting, he has not returned or communicated with the State Government. His application for leave was not accepted in 2008 and he has been absent since then.
Atul Bagai, a 1983 batch officer has been away since 1995. Some say that he has also taken up a foreign assignment and is in Bangkok. Sanjay Bhatia, a 1990 batch officer who is also believed to have taken up an assignment with a foreign institution, has not bothered to inform the State Government about his whereabouts. Rita Singh, a 1997 batch officer, has also not been reporting for work without taking leave from the competent authority.
Rahul Anand of the 1996 batch, however, takes the cake along with lV Nilesh, 1991 Maharashtra and Anil Yadav 1999 MP. Rahul's last posting was as District Collector, Hamirpur in 2005 and since then he has been on extended study leave during which he took a degree from Harvard University before joining the International Monetary Fund. Nilesh, in fact, got his name changed to Nilesh londhe and joined Microsoft. Yadav's whereabouts are not known for the last ten years.
Puneet Arora the 1997 batch IPS officer of AGMUT cadre was last posted in North district as Additional DCP-II in 2004. He proceeded on study leave to the US and is said to be working there. Arora never resigned or informed the MHA and according to one of his batchmates, “He is very much in the service and also out of it”.
According to Rule 7 (2) of IAS leave Rules: “A member of the Service shall be deemed to have resigned from the service if he/she is absent without authorisation for a period exceeding one year from the date of expiry of sanctioned leave or permission, or is absent from duty for a continuous period exceeding five years, or continues in foreign service beyond the period approved.”
However, it seems that for these deserters the rulebook has been set aside. “It is incumbent upon the Government of the day to take notice and initiate punitive measures against them,” said another official who does not want to be identified.