IAS Officers can now be prosecuted for corruption by private persons

July 22, 2016

No one escapes the eyes of the law and the Modi government has rolled out new laws to make sure no one escapes after committing corrupt deeds. Empowering private persons to seek sanction for prosecution of IAS officers in corruption cases, the Modi government has outlined the procedure for handling such requests and set a three-month deadline for their disposal. As per the proposed guidelines, a request for prosecution sanction may be routed through either the state government or the central ministry/department where the civil servant is employed, allowing them to conduct a preliminary probe before it is taken up by the department of personnel and training for a decision . The guidelines - shared on Thursday by DoPT with all states/UTs and central ministries/departments for their comments to be submitted by August 12 - are a first since the Supreme Court, in a 2012 ruling in Dr Subramanian Swamy Vs Manmohan Singh case, held that there is no provision in the PCA or CrPC that bars a citizen from filing a complaint for prosecution of a public servant alleged to have committed an offence. The court said it deemed proper to observe that in future every competent authority shall take appropriate action on the representation made by a citizen for sanction of the prosecution of a public servant, so as to identify and obviate the areas causing delays in processing of such proposals. Sharing that the SC verdict triggered a flow of such requests from private citizens, DoPT said many, however, were in nature in complaints rather than a proper proposal. & quot Keeping in view the basic parameters and requirements for cases received from investigating agencies, it has been decided that the procedure for handling the requests for prosecution sanction received from private citizens may be streamlined,& quot the DoPT said adding that such proposals may now be routed through the concerned state government or central department/ministry & quot as it is best placed to provide basic inputs as regards misconduct of concerned public servant& quot . Even where the proposal is directly received by DoPT, the same may be sent first to the concerned state government or Central departments. for preliminary examination.

OUR TAKE

No one should be able to misuse the power in their hands for their own good, keeping the interest of their country below theirs. Corruption is the worst disease plaguing India right now and stringent measures are needed to make sure that the root cause is weeded out. Putting the power in the hands of the public will instill some sense of fear among the corrupt people. Be it the Minister or any IAS officer or for that matter, any common man, the hands of the law should tie them and make lives hard for them.