Who dares to be an IAS officer?

A Karnataka cadre IAS officer, D.K. Ravi, allegedly committed suicide on March 16 in Bengaluru. The state CID is conducting a probe into the death. It is widely known that Ravi had taken on the sand and land mafias in the state, giving rise to widespread suspicion that his death may not be a simple case of suicide due to personal reasons as the state government and police have insisted. This is probably the first incident of its kind in Karnataka, perhaps a pointer also to how illegal mafias have become so brazen and blatant in the state. 

Protests continue over his death as the political Opposition, riding on a wave of popular anger and demand for justice, demand a CBI inquiry into Ravi’s death. The state government agreed to order a CBI probe after Congress president Sonia Gandhi stepped in.

While one must not jump to conclusions in the matter, there is no doubt that in states across India, both civil administrations and police forces are subjected to heavy pressure by the politicians, as well as by the rich and the mighty. Two years ago, in Uttar Pradesh, when a young lady IAS officer was suspended and transferred, a politician of the ruling party was caught on camera boasting that he had gotten her punished for taking on the illegal sand mafia in the state.

It is true that politicians — all over the world — seek to use the bureaucracy to further their own interests, or that of their benefactors from whom they have received or expect to receive favours.

In my own case, I came under tremendous pressure to go slow in one probe or take a ‘lenient’ view in another, as in the infamous fodder scam that surfaced in 1996 in Bihar. I told my political bosses of the time that if they had something to say in the matter, they should do so in writing. I became a victim of the politician-mafia nexus and was immediately transferred from the CBI to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs. But in 2013, two former chief ministers of the state — Lalu Prasad Yadav and Jagannath Mishra — and many more powerful politicians and bureaucrats were convicted in the fodder scam cases and sentenced to jail.

Similarly, one cannot forget how a young IPS officer, Narendra Kumar Singh, was crushed to death in March 2012 under the wheels of a tractor-trolley by the mining mafia in Madhya Pradesh’s Morena district. Singh, like D.K. Ravi, was a 2009 batch officer and was posted at Banmore. On patrol one day, he chased and overtook the heavy vehicle that was carrying illegal quarry and signaled to its driver to stop. Instead, the driver ran the tractor over Singh, killing the 30-year-old officer on the spot.

We are also well aware of how Ashok Khemka, a senior IAS officer of the Haryana cadre, has been transferred some 44 times in his 21 years of service, a victime of the politician-mafia nexus for raising his voice against irregularities in land deals in the state.

Even as we speak, one can be sure that some bureaucrat or police officer is being pressured somewhere. It’s an everyday phenomenon. When you do not toe the line of those at the helm of affairs, you face consequences.

As far as the investigation into the death of D.K. Ravi is concerned, it is imperative that the Siddaramaiah government in  Karnataka does not try to cover-up, or is  seen to be doing so. It’s well known that the boom in the state’s real estate sector in the last 20 years has resulted in several land scams, gang wars and murders; Ravi is himself known to have taken on powerful forces; he was transferred from Kolar, where he took on the sand mafia, by this very government, allegedly under pressure from ruling party politicians. The truth, and the whole truth, must come out.

(Joginder Singh is a former Director of the Central Bureau of Investigation)