Sanjiv Chaturvedi

Sanjiv Chaturvedi
Born	(1974-12-21) 21 December 1974
Nationality	Indian
Citizenship	Indian
Education	B. Tech
Alma mater	Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology[1]
Occupation	Bureaucrat (Indian Forest Service)
Years active	2002-present
Employer	Government of India
Organization	Indian Forest Service
Known for	Exposing corruption in Haryana State Government and AIIMS
Awards	S R Jindal Prize in 2011 for "Crusade against Corruption"

Sanjiv Chaturvedi is an Indian Forest Service officer and currently the deputy secretary of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).^[2] He also served as a Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) at AIIMS during 2012-14.

Indian Forest Service

Sanjiv Chaturvedi is a 1995 batch Electrical Engineer from Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology (NIT Allahabad) and a 2002 batch Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer from the Haryana cadre. He was ranked second in the IFS exam, and won two medals for excellence as a trainee. The officer is routinely invited by National Police Academy, Hyderabad, National Administrative Academy, Mussourie; National Forest Academy, Dehradun for delivering lecture to senior officers and probationers on issue of anti-corruption strategies.

Haryana Tenure

His first posting was in Kurukshetra, where he registered an FIR against contractors involved in the construction of Hansi Butana canal. He accused the contractors of illegal tree felling and poaching hog deer in the nearby Saraswati Wildlife Sanctuary. He was reprimanded by the Principaly Secretary (Forests), and transferred to Fatehabad. In August 2007, he was suspended for insubordination. Soon after his suspension, the Haryana Forest Department started prosecution against the contractors, based on earlier reports filed by him. The Haryana Government protected the violators, after a Delhi-based NGO moved against them in the Supreme Court.^[3]

Chaturvedi accused MLA Prahlad Singh Gillakhera of corruption, stating that his relatives were buying rare trees for their personal gardens with the taxpayers' money.^[4] During 2007-08, Chaturvedi alleged corruption in a project for establishment of a herbal park. The scam allegedly involved a state minister, an MLA and some bureaucrats. He also exposed irregularities in the plantation projects in Hissar and Jhajjar. Following this, several criminal cases were filed against him. According to his supporters, these were based on bogus FIRs. He also faced four inquiries by the Vigilance Bureau. As an officer in Haryana, Chaturvedi was transferred 12 times. ^[3][5] Chaturvedi's in-laws filed a dowry case against him, and his marriage ended in divorce. According to his supporters, his ex-wife was persuaded to believe that he sought the transfers to avoid her.^[4] In 2009, a case was registered against him for misuse of funds and bogus plantation in Jhajjar district – this was the same case which had exposed corruption in, leading to suspension of nine officers.^[6]

Alleging that he was being harassed by the Haryana State Government, Chaturvedi requested a Central Government deputation in 2010. He complained of harassment to President Pratibha Patil, who referred his case to the Cabinet Secretariat. Acting on the directions of the Cabinet Secretariat, the Ministry of Environment and Forests constituted a two-member panel to study the accusations, in 2010. The Ministry's in-house inquiry found merit in Chaturvedi's allegations, and referred the case to CBI, whose preliminary analysis found the allegations worthy of investigation. The Ministry then referred the case to Central Vigilance Commission (CVC), and recommended a CBI investigation. The Ministry also confirmed the harassment of Chaturvedi and recommended quashing of cases against him. The chargesheet against him was quashed by the President on 19 January 2011.^[7] Accordingly, the chargesheet was quashed by the President on January 19. The Haryana government rejected the Ministry's findings, and asked it to take a fresh look at the case. However, this demand was rejected by the ministry.^[7] The Haryana Government refused to relieve Chaturvedi for Central deputation, but in May 2012, an order from the Ministry overruled the Haryana Government.^[3]

A record number of four orders were passed by President of India, in support of the officer, quashing various illegal orders of Haryana Government, between years 2008 to 2014, which is a record number in case of any officer in the history of independent India, regarding, suspension, departmental chargesheet and ACRs.^[8]

The officer brought the cases of corruption involving Haryana Chief Minister, Forest Minister and other senior functionaries by filing a criminal writ petition before the Supreme Court immediately after his central deputation wherein the Supreme Court issued notices for CBI investigation in November, 2012.

AIIMS

On 29 June 2012, Chaturvedi was made the Deputy Director of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Delhi. He was also given the additional charge of Chief Vigilance Officer (CVO) at AIIMS. As a CVO, Chaturvedi took action against the doctors who were making unauthorized foreign trips. During his tenure, the police seized banned drugs worth 6 crore from a vehicle supplying drugs to an on-campus pharmacy owned by an Indian National Congress MLA. The then health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, signed two internal reports which rated Chaturvedi's work as a CVO as "outstanding".^[5]

In 2014, Chaturvedi was relieved from the additional charge of CVO, although he continued to retain the Deputy Director post at AIIMS. On August 16, he wrote a letter to the new health minister Harsh Vardhan of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), alleging that his removal from the CVO post was a result of campaign by corrupt officials. He was supported by AIIMS staff, who wrote a letter to the Prime Minister asking for his reinstatement. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) held protests in his support. The media and the AAP alleged that the BJP leader JP Nadda was acting against Chaturvedi on behalf of Vineet Chaudhary, an IAS officer from his own state, Himachal Pradesh. As a CVO, Chaturvedi had accused Chaudhary of bending rules to give tenure extension to an engineer supervising works worth 3,700 crore. Chaturvedi had also accused two security contractor firms of serious violations, one of which was owned by the BJP Rajya Sabha MP RK Sinha.^[5][9]

Harsh Vardhan stated that Chaturvedi had been removed because was not eligible for the CVO post, and the government had no malafide intention in the decision. He pointed out that a 2012 letter by CVC indicated that he had been appointed as CVO without the Commission's approval. He stated that this was brought to his attention recently, and the step of removing Chaturvedi was taken accordingly. He also stated that the CVO function was being duplicated at the Ministry and AIIMS levels, and that JP Nadda had no role to play in Chaturvedi's removal. He also pointed out that Chaturvedi had not been removed from AIIMS, and continued to be its Deputy Secretary.^[10][11]

In fact, in the file for removal of the officer from the post of CVO, AIIMS, a record number of 20 signatures were put up in just 24 hours right from the level of section officer to the Union Health Minister, on 13-14.08.2014. ^[12] Because during his two years tenure in the AIIMS he initiated actions in record number of cases (around 200) in which punishment was imposed in 78 cases, chargesheet was issued in 87 and more than 20 cases were referred to CBI for criminal investigation.

Acting on a Public Interest Litigation filed by a well known lawyer Mr. Prashant Bhushan, Delhi High Court has issued notice to Mr. J.P. Nadda, the Union Health Minister on corruption issues exposed by this officer.^[13]

Anti Corruption Bureau

In 2015, the media reported that AAP was planning to appoint Chaturvedi as the chief of Delhi anti-corruption bureau.^[14]

On 17 February 2015 Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal wrote to Cabinet Minister Prakash Javdekar that the services of Sanjiv Chaturvedi are urgently required on on central deputation in the Chief Minister office, Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi, as Officer on Special Duty (O.S.D).

Delhi Government issued another reminder on 28.02.2015 to the Cabinet Minister Prakash Javadekar for deputation of the officer, with the hope that no partisan/ulterior considerations would be allowed to come into this case.

SIT

In 2009, Mr. Chaturvedi went on to expose large-scale bungling in plantation projects funded by the Centre and international agencies in Jhajjar and Hissar divisions. On the basis of his evidence, around 40 field staff were chargesheeted and since the scandal broke in the midst of the 2009 Lok Sabha election campaign, Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s son, Deepender Singh Hooda, in whose constituency Jhajjar falls, was hugely embarrassed.

Mr. Chaturvedi was again chargesheeted but was cleared by a rare intervention by the President in January 2011. And on the recommendations of the CBI and the CVC, the Ministry of Environment and Forests asked the Haryana government to hand over the matter to the CBI for investigation. This has not been done so far.

However, five months after Mr. Chaturvedi suspended the foresters, one of them, a range officer named Sanjiv Tomar, was found dead at his home in Jhajjar. The police lodged a case against Mr. Chaturvedi for abetting suicide, even though Tomar’s father, Ram Pal Tomar, in his complaint before the police had recorded that his son had died due to other reasons. An internal police inquiry too found no evidence to implicate Mr. Chaturvedi but the inquiry report was not filed before the trial court. In January, at around the time that the Centre recommended a CBI enquiry into the Jhajjar fake plantations, Ram Pal Tomar did an about turn and stated before the IG of Police, Rohtak that his son had committed suicide because he had been suspended by Mr. Chaturvedi. The case was reopened.^[15]

In February 2015, the Punjab and Haryana High Court recommended formation of a special investigation team (SIT) to probe the allegations that a forest range officer Sanjeev Tomar had committed suicide due to harassment by Chaturvedi. This was based on a petition filed by the deceased's father, Rampal Singh Tomar. Sanjeev Tomar had committed suicide in 2009, after initiation of anti-corruption proceedings against him. According to the Jhajjar Superintendent of Police, Chaturvedi had nothing to do with suicide of Tomar, who was disturbed due to corruption and dowry cases against him.^[16]

Mr. Chaturvedi moved in a review petition before the Punjab and Haryana High Court challenging the orders forming SIT on 20th Feb, where orders were recalled and notices were again issued to the parties and state government is directed to produce all the files relating to the investigation that has been undertaken in this case ^[17]

On 30.4.2015, the High Court accepted Review Petition of Mr Chaturvedi and recalled its earlier order directing Haryana Director General of Police to constitute a SIT. The High Court also dismissed the writ petition of deceased's father Ram Pal Tomar. Chaturvedi's counsel had argued that the case was already investigated by four different SITs and reports of these SITs were reviewed by the DGP, the IGP and the then SP. Therefore, constituting a fresh SIT would amount to hounding the officer who had exposed several forest scams in the State and on his complaint the Central Government had constituted an enquiry committee which had severely indicted Mrs Kiran Chaudhary, the then Forest Minister as also the office of then Chief Minister of Haryana, Mr. Bhupinder Singh Hooda. As directed by the High Court, the State had produced reports of earlier SITs giving a clean chit to Mr Chaturvedi and recommending cancellation reports. The SIT reports found that deceased had committed suicide since he was facing litigation from his wife; was being proceeded departmentally for his involvement in a scam and was living with a woman named Promila. The FSL report found alcohol in his abdomen. After examining reports of earlier SITs, the Court declared that again constituting SIT would be a needless exercise.

Awards

• He received two medals in the subjects of “People and Forest” and “Biodiversity and Wildlife Management”, from the then President of India, Mr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam in August, 2005 after completion of training at Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy, Dehradun.
• Manjunath Shanmugam Integrity Award (2009), for his work in Haryana^[18]
• S R Jindal Prize in 2011 for "Crusade against Corruption" with a cash prize of Rs. 10 Lakhs, for his efforts in exposing corruption in high places.^[19]

References