Kerala is witnessing a bandh of a different kind today. The protest, in a first in Kerala and perhaps even in the country, has been called by the government of Kerala. All the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers (except the 14 district collectors), are on casual leave on January 9 to protest against what they call victimisation by a senior member of the police service.
The officers have submitted their leave applications to send a message to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan no less. Their grouse is directed against Jacob Thomas, director of the vigilance and anti-corruption bureau because they feel he is abusing his powers.
The Babu vs Babus battle has been on for many months in Kerala now. Thomas has, in recent months, booked cases of corruption against three senior IAS officers. These include Additional Chief Secretaries KM Abraham and Tom Jose, both facing charges of assets disproportionate to their known sources of income and S Padmakumar, former managing director of the Kerala state-run Malabar Cements. Padmakumar was arrested for alleged irregularities in the company. Jose, incidentally, heads the state IAS officers’ association.
The reason why the IAS lobby has pressed the protest button against Thomas, who belongs to the Indian Police Service (IPS) is because they now want to express their “sadness, frustration and professional dissatisfaction”. The mass casual leave plan is provoked by the latest move by the Vigilance Department. It named Additional Chief Secretary (Industries) Paul Antony as the third accused in a case relating to alleged nepotism in the appointment of a relative by former Industries minister EP Jayarajan, who is the first accused in the case. Jayarajan, who is a senior Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader from Kannur district, had to quit in embarrassing circumstances last year after it was revealed that he had appointed two relatives to senior positions in organisations under his ministry’s control.
The IAS lobby defends Antony saying he was only following the instructions given by Jayarajan.
This tussle has landed Vijayan in a spot. The Chief Minister had handpicked Thomas for the high-profile post in order to send a message that his government will have a no-tolerance policy towards corruption. This was in the context of the previous United Democratic Front regime being marked by several scandals including, the solar and bar scams.
Thomas was the right man for the job. A barometer of his popularity was seen when Malayalam channel Manorama News conducted a poll to select “The Newsmaker” of 2015. Thomas was chosen over popular film stars in a movie-crazy Kerala. But little did Vijayan realise that Thomas, who clearly has many admirers in the public (but few friends in the bureaucracy) will cause the wheels of administration to get jammed in this manner. Vijayan cannot expect any support from the opposition Congress given how Thomas gave them a torrid time during the Oommen Chandy regime.
But given Thomas’s track record and credentials, Vijayan should have seen it coming. In July 2014, during Thomas’s earlier stint in the Vigilance department, the anti-corruption crusader led raids against top government officials. When the bar bribery scam broke out, he began investigating links which allegedly led to then finance minister KM Mani. Soon he was moved to the Fire department.
That was Chandy’s mistake. Thomas trained his guns on prominent builders who had violated fire safety norms. Within four months, Chandy transferred him out again to the loopline posting of Kerala Police Housing Corporation. Chandy had then admitted that Thomas through his actions had put his government in trouble.
Vijayan cannot expect any support from the Opposition (Congress), given how Thomas gave them a torrid time during the Oommen Chandy regime. In fact, the Congress is playing a clever game by siding with the IAS lobby.
The IAS officers have sought to throw muck at Thomas by claiming that his integrity is “prima facie doubtful and not beyond suspicion”. They cite instances of alleged corruption when he was Ports Director and that he also faced a land encroachment case in Karnataka. But more than anything else, they paint his actions as “motivated, vindictive and vengeful”.
The Congress is trying to get back at Thomas for the grief he caused the party. It blames Vijayan for not taking action against Thomas based on the allegations by the IAS association.
Vijayan is on the horns of a dilemma because if he transfers Thomas to buy peace with a more vocal bureaucracy, he would look compromised in public perception. Backing Thomas comes with its own share of problems.
Kerala has the infamous reputation of being a land of hartals but this sarkaari bandh is in a league of its own and does not do the image of the Kerala government any good.