Maharashtra revenue department tops in corruption cases

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) which is entrusted with the responsibility of keeping a watch against the corrupt government officials across different departments in Maharashtra has released numbers that reveal that the revenue department has clocked the maximum number of corruption cases followed by the police department. The data shared for the general public by ACB officials on its website claims that from January till August 20, this year, a total of 131 trap cases were registered against revenue officers. The maximum number of cases were registered against officers belonging to 'Class III' and the money recovered in such cases was close to Rs 26 lakh. In the police department, which came a close second, a total of 123 cases have been registered and Rs 42 lakhs has been recovered so far. Another worrying trend that has emerged out of the information is the low rate of conviction in these corruption cases.

Speaking more about the trap cases, an officer who refused to be named told DNA that the wing has identified a total of 44 government departments. Over the span of eight-and-a-half months, the ACB this year has registered 548 trap cases across departments and the total amount of money recovered so far is Rs 1,30,24,335.

However, despite the high number of cases institutional red-tapism hinders and impacts conviction in most of the cases.

"Apart from the trap cases, we do face some difficulties in probing the matter such as getting the prosecution sanctions from the concerned department, ensuring suspension of the corrupt official from his service and getting necessary permissions from authorities to conduct an enquiry and registering an FIR. The major concern for us is to ensure a maximum number of convictions in the matters coming to us," explained the officer.

Another source from ACB said that as compared to 2014, there has been a consistent fall in conviction rate. "In 2014, the rate was 32% followed by 8%, 6%, 21%, 17% and 27% till 2019 respectively. The number of acquittals has gone up because of a slowdown in the process from the government department to act on the request of enquiry," added the source.

However, RTI activist Kamlakar Shenoy who has filed queries related to the functioning of the ACB said that the wing has become defunct totally as only a few FIRs have been lodged by the officers from 2015 till 2018. " The ACB has registered trapped cases only for lower-class officers while the main culprits are the bureaucrats and the politicians who are never penalised," added Shenoy.