Suspended Animation

Maharashtra’s yes man—Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan

The Prithviraj Chavan-led government in Maharashtra is going all out to appease the opposition. The ongoing budget session of the state legislature has seen the ruling Congress-NCP coalition’s ministers cozying up to the Shiv Sena-BJP combine like crazy. Whenever opposition politicians find cops or state officials in their way, they raise dubious demands for their suspension as a rap on the knuckles. Strangely enough, the government has been complying.

Or perhaps, not so strangely. Under pressure on account of a blitz of corruption scandals, the government appears to have calculated that the best way to quieten the opposition is to shield them from cops and administration officials. In the three weeks that the legislature has been in session, an estimated 75 officials and policemen have been suspended from service. Astonishingly, this was all announced in the first week itself.

Of these, 50 are from the agriculture department, and this is just the first phase. “About 450 employees have been indicted for lacunae in the implementation of the PM’s package for Vidharba farmers. Suspensions will be in phases,” says Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, minister for agriculture. Meanwhile, RR Patil, the state’s home minister, is on his own suspension spree—being done even before departmental inquiries can be announced. “The home minister is taking arbitrary decisions,” says a police commissioner, “He does not consult police commissioners or superintendents in these decisions. We come to know of suspensions through newspapers. The police personnel are not even given a chance to defend themselves. Fearing suspensions, police personnel have now been reduced to servile slaves with no voice.”

The opposition is pleased, though, and so is the government. Politicians across the spectrum can now head for their usual European vacation with complete peace of mind. Left furious would be the police department and bureaucracy. “This is preposterous,” says a former state bureaucrat, “A government can’t suspend so many of its employees. Who will do the work?” Employee unions have made it clear that they will disallow any extra burden on those who remain. Nor will they let the government hire replacements on a contract basis, which would strain the debt-ridden state’s finances, especially since service rules state that a suspended employee must be paid half his/her salary until proven guilty.

Not all the suspensions announced have actually happened, though. “Often when suspensions are announced while the legislature is in session, they are not implemented immediately,” says a source in the general administration department, “Suspended employees often use political godfathers to get [the orders] revoked.”

MaharashtraPrithviraj Chavan