GS4 · UPSC Mains

You are young upright person who has been newly appointed in the Anti-Corruption Bureau of your district. After joining, your office receives a tip-off from an anonymous person that an engineer working with the Municipal Corporation of the city has amassed wealth much beyond his known sources of income and is hand in gloves in corrupt activities. Because the law is clear that anonymous complaints cannot be acted upon, you ignore the complaint. But in the next few weeks, you receive a few more anonymous complaints against the concerned engineer. You begin to make enquiries against the engineer and find that he is indeed a very corrupt officer. Some time later, you make up your mind to conduct raids on his office and house, even though you have not received any official complaint in the prescribed format against him till date. What you unearth during the raids is shocking for you and your staff. You find not only vast amounts of unaccounted currency, much beyond the means of the engineer, but also gold, travel tickets to visits made abroad, reservations in five-star hotels, and a whole bunch of clinching evidence against influential politicians and bureaucrats - appointed in the past as well as present ones - in the district. However, soon after conducting the raid, you start receiving subtle messages from your superiors to drop the investigation in the interest of your own long-term career and the safety and security of your loved ones. They also point out that you had not followed the rules stipulated for conducting the raid, and if the matter were to reach the courts, it would be disposed off in no time due to procedural lapses on your part. Since, you are an upright officer, you ignore these warnings and continue with your investigation. However, soon you are put on administrative leave on the ground of flouting the rules. You also come to know that a few of your juniors have filed a complaint against you for being involved in corruption. They have also complained that you instructed them to extort money from not only the concerned engineer but also the politicians and bureaucrats against whom you unearthed evidence, to put a halt to the investigation. Based on the above scenario, answer the following: (a) Identify the various stakeholders and the issues involved in the case. (b) What options do you have in the given situation? (c) Analyse the merits and demerits of each of these options. (d) Discuss your course of action, with proper justification.

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GS4 · Case studies on the above issues GS4 · Probity in governance — concept of public service; philosophical basis; information sharing & transparency; RTI; codes of ethics; work culture; service delivery; corruption; challenges

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