Controversial Gujarat IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt, who created a ripple by submitting to the Supreme Court an affidavit saying that Chief Minister Narendra Modi wanted to teach Muslims a lesson, has a shady past. Apart from being indicted by the National Human Rights Commission for planting narcotics in a hotel room to implicate and arrest an advocate of Rajasthan in a drug peddling case, the officer is also an accused in a major recruitment scam that hit Gujarat in 1996.
Documents with The Pioneer show that Bhatt was charge-sheeted on December 12 last year in course of a departmental inquiry into police recruitment in Gujarat in May 1996. Bhatt was chairman of the recruitment process as Superintendent of Police of Banskantha. Sources said Bhatt has not yet submitted his defence.
Bhatt was directed by the Government on August 31 last year to report to Principal, SRP Training College, Junagadh in DIG grade. But so far he has not resumed his duties despite repeated instructions by his superiors. Bhatt applied for leave claiming his mother was ill. The Gujarat DGP has asked a senior officer to look into the whole episode regarding Bhatt not joining the service.
Through a “Confidential” Memorandum number ENQ/2520101931/G, the Home department of Gujarat served a show-cause notice on Bhatt on December 29, 2010 to hold an inquiry into the role in the recruitment scam.
“The State Government proposes to hold an enquiry against Shri Sanjiv Bhatt, IPS (GJ.1988) under Rule 8 of All India Services (Discipline & Appeal) Rules, 1969. The substance of the imputations of misconduct in respect of which the inquiry is proposed to be held is set out in the enclosed statement of articles of charge. A statement of imputations of misconduct in support of each article of charge is enclosed,” the memo said.
Through the memo, the Government directed Bhatt to submit a written statement in his defence within 30 days. He was also told that if he did not respond within the time or refused to appear before the inquiry, the inquiry will proceed ex-parte.
Thereafter, Bhatt was served the charges. The statement of imputation signed by Rajnikant Sawara, Section Officer, Home Department, said,.”…Sanjiv Bhatt, IPS (G.L1988) while serving as Superintendent of Po1ice, Banaskantha District during 13.10.1995 to 18.06.1996, committed the following acts of omission and commission during recruitment of constables in the year 1996.”
The charge-sheet against Bhatt stated that he did not maintain a recruitment register to ensure that photograph of all successful candidates who appeared in the examination of Police Constables along with their thumb impression were preserved. This should have been done as per the order of the DGP. “As chairman of the recruitment committee, Banaskanhta District, Sanjiv Bhatt is responsible for such a major lacuna and thereby he failed to maintain effective supervision on the recruitment process,” the charge-sheet said.
Bhatt also ignored a directive of the DGP to make recruitment of armed and unarmed police constables separately. However, Bhatt went for a combined recruitment of armed police constables and unarmed police constables “and thereby violated the instruction given by Director General and Inspector General of Police vide letter dated 24.6.94.”
Due to this lack of supervision on the part of Bhatt, several candidates (No. 0925, 1209, 1260, 1261, 1594, 1611, 1693, 18G4, 3151, 3355, 3358, 4071; 4397, 4948, 4973, 5062, 5151, 8174) who failed in physical fitness test earlier managed to appear in the second stage of physical fitness test .
Bhatt also did not issue duty allocation orders to his subordinate police officers and civilian staff during recruitment process of police constables.
The selection committee, Banaskantha, specified the marks to be given for achieving different standards of various physical tests for the recruitment of police constables. “It is necessary to mention time, distance and marks given to each candidate in each event of physical tests separately in long jump, high jump, running, etc. During recruitment in the year 1996 in Banaskantha district no such procedure was followed and remarks like ‘Pass’ or ‘Fail’ were made on interview call letter. As a chairman of recruitment committee and head of office of the Superintendent of Police, Sanjiv Bhatt is responsible for such a major lacuna and thereby he failed to maintain effective supervision,” the charge-sheet said.
Bhatt bifurcated the selected candidates into graduate and undergraduate sections and allocated them in the unarmed and armed cadre respectively, ignoring merit number obtained by the candidates. In doing so, Bhatt ignored merit of candidates in violation of natural justice.
“In all these irregularities, the act of Sanjiv Bhatt shows misuse of power, carelessness and apathy towards his duty. The conduct of Bhatt amounts to violation of Rule 3(1) of All India Services (Conduct) Rules, 1968,” the chargesheet said.
Courtesy : http://www.dailypioneer.com/334703/Why-IPS-Bhatt-hates-Narendra-Modi.html
I THINK THIS PIECE OF INFORMATION IS ENOUGH...PERSONALLY I D'NT THINK WE AS AN INDIAN SHOULD REPEAT THIS KIND OF MISTAKE AGAIN AN OVER AGAIN..Goswami, a medical doctor by training before joining the IAS – he acquired his MD degree after receiving a gold medal for topping the MBBS exam from Benaras Hindu University (BHU) – had displayed his undiminished zeal for public service when he was released on bail in November 2006 after spending 18 months in jail. He had declared his wish to devote himself fulltime in the absolutely free treatment of AIDS patients. "His illness deteriorated mostly due to his feeling of demoralisation. The Nitish government revoked his suspension on December 2008. He could have lived longer if the government had done it earlier," said his lawyer Tuhin Shankar.
ReplyDeleteHis widow, Dr Anuradha Goswami, was too inconsolable to speak, but his grieving father, Dr Utpalendu Goswami, suggested that his son was put on a political and social trial long before the real trial in a court could begin. A sobbing Utpalendu Goswami told TEHELKA: "He himself knew, and all of us in the family and his close friends in the bureaucracy knew, that he was innocent. He was waiting for the time to prove it. But the entire atmosphere of stigma and animosity created around him caused him constant mental torture all these years and this worsened his sickness. The hero of Time died before his time".