Oh, what a fall Siddaramaiah!
Having watched Siddaramaiah’s long career in Karnataka politics, I can ex cathedra say that he today stands bereft of the reputation and esteem he had commanded when he assumed office as chief minister in May 2013. At that time, he had the attributes of being a clean politician who had concern for the downtrodden and of mastery over the state’s finances with his long years as Finance Minister. He is today at the receiving end of criticisms and allegations, of accepting an expensive wristwatch from a doctor friend living in a Gulf country, contrary to the image he has cultivated over the years; of subverting the Lokayukta institution by setting up an Anti-Corruption Bureau. And now, he has capped it all with twin charges of nepotism. To boot, it has even been claimed that the watch presented to the CM is a stolen one figuring in a case that has been investigated and dismissed by the Anti-Corruption Bureau.
There is a parallel in Karnataka politics to what has befallen Siddaramaiah today. Former chief minister D. Devaraj Urs is being hailed as a great benefactor of the backward classes, though he himself belonged to a forward caste, Arasu, who were the rulers of Old Mysore. To set matters right, it has to be pointed out that the policy of reservation in princely Mysore and Madras Karnataka had predated Urs by decades. He only revived the system of reservation based on caste and ended the 14 year interregnum of income-related reservation from 1963 to 1977. Urs faced serious allegations of corruption, though they might not compare with the colossal proportions of today’s corruption.
The Justice A.N. Grover Commission of Inquiry appointed by the then Janata government at the Centre indicted Urs in three specific cases. What has receded from public memory is that Urs had attempted to preempt the Centre at that time and had appointed a commission of inquiry against himself. Late Justice Mir Iqbal Hussain of the Mysore High Court had constituted that inquiry and he held a few sittings. The High Court struck down the appointment of the Iqbal Hussain commission.
The latest in the train of allegations against the CM is that his government has favoured a private firm, Matrix Imaging Solutions India, which has been permitted to open a diagnostic laboratory at the government-run Victoria Hospital. One of the directors of this firm is Dr. Yathindra, the younger of the CM’s two sons. The other facet of the allegation pertaining to this is that this firm has been shown undue favour by the BDA in the allotment of an “alternative plot” of two acres in the pricey Hebbal area. The BDA, which is known more for harassing citizens approaching it without “affluence or influence”, allotted the alternative plot as the original land allotted to the firm came to be earmarked for acquisition for a residential layout.
Till now, very little was known about Yathindra, and it had been said he had little interest in politics. However, it was known that the CM’s elder son, Rakesh, had political ambitions and was indeed wielding authority without responsibility. As if to buttress the claim that Yathindra is far removed from politics is his reported statement that “neither I nor my father was aware of the guidelines preventing the kin of ministers from participating in business concerns and services of the government”.
It is amazing that the educated son of a veteran politician is ignorant of elementary canons of public conduct like propriety, conflict of interest, and keeping aloof from the administration. It has to be pointed out that whether there exist guidelines or not, it is a question of propriety which is little observed in today’s politics. The pathologist should be enlightened about the fact that nepotism too amounts to corruption.
The latest allegation has come at a very inconvenient moment for the chief minister, with all the talk of unseating him in the air. The old faithfuls in the state Congress have never reconciled themselves to Siddaramaiah, whom they consider to be an ‘outsider’, becoming the CM. Those ranged against him include the former external affairs minister S.M. Krishna, who is not disinclined to lead the state government again. Home minister and state party chief Dr. G. Parameshwar has his own ambitions. But the most outspoken critic of Siddaramaiah is former Union minister Janardhana Poojary, known for his probity. It must have embarrassed the chief minister that Congress general secretary in charge of the state, Digvijay Singh, went on record saying that Yathindra should quit as director of the private firm -- which the CM’s son has since done.
What is surprising about Siddaramaiah is that his recent decisions and actions hardly square up with his standing as a champion of the minorities, backward classes and dalits (together, AHINDA). Like most of his predecessors, Siddaramaiah has hardly tackled the problem of corruption in government. In fact, corrupt officials have been given key positions in the name of caste. The move to revive the ACB is seen as an attempt to protect corrupt politicians and officials. The ACB would have become functional by now but for a High Court stay on the move to transfer corruption cases being probed by the Lokayukta, and even those awaiting sanction for prosecution, to the ACB.
Siddaramaiah’s stubbornness in insisting on the appointment of Justice S.R. Nayak as the Lokayukta has rendered the agency defunct - without a Lokayukta and two Upa-lokayuktas. The one Upa-lokayukta, Justice Subash Adi, who was going after the corrupt, is today out of action with the state Assembly seeking his removal.
In fairness to Siddaramaiah, it must be said that some of his predecessors too faced allegations of corruption and even commissions of inquiry – including one to probe irregularities in the construction of the Vidhana Soudha by Kengal Hanumanthayya, only to be wound up after a few sittings. Though hailed as a values-based politician, Ramakrishna Hegde had to face the Justice Kuldip Singh Inquiry Commission which went into the Revajeethu and Lokhandwala Construction Company scandals. Hegde was indicted by Justice Kuldip Singh.
He too had appointed a commission of inquiry against his son, late Bharat Hegde, in what was called the MD seat scandal. Even S.Nijalingappa had encountered allegations on the Sharavathi project. Today, the only former chief minister to have undergone the ignominy of going to jail on a charge of corruption is the state’s new BJP chief B.S.Yeddyurappa. He had been remanded to judicial custody by a Lokayukta court in October 2011 in a land denotification case. He was sent to jail without being convicted and sentenced.
Some of the other former chief ministers were lucky to escape judicial scrutiny. But that does not absolve them of the charges of amassing illegal wealth. Unfortunately, corruption has become a way of life in Karnataka, irrespective of the party in power.