Senior bureaucrat Sit aram Kunte, 1985 batch IAS officer, has become the only out going BMC commissioner to have been sidelined.After completing his three years at BMC, Kunte was sent to the environment department and in less than a month, to the finance department. At present, Kunte heads the most insignificant expenditure branch. In the corridors of power, it is believed that unwanted bureaucrats are posted to the expenditure branch.Acursory glance at the assignments given to Kunte's predecessors leads one to the conclusion that most got plum postings after the BMC tenure. Kunte's predecessor, Subodh Kumar, a favourite of the then CM Prithviraj Chavan, was given a three-month extension after retirement, a rare case in bureaucracy . Kumar's predecessor Swadheen Kshatriya, despite his unceremonious exit, was appointed to the revenue department and later became chief secretary. Former commissioner Jairaj Phatak had taken up an assignment with the rural electrification corporation, a government of India undertaking. Another former civic chief, Johny Joseph, was appointed chief secretary and after retirement, upa-lokayukta. Now Joseph heads a high-level panel on environment impact assessment. Karun Srivastava, after a prolonged stint in the home department and MMRDA, retired as civic commissioner after completing tenure.
Being snubbed
For senior BJP leader and housing minister Prakash Mehta, humiliation, ill treatment and insult have become a routine affair, so as such, he was not surprised when security guards at the BMC headquar ters asked him for identity proof during a visit.A week ago, Mehta, accompanied by BJP legislator Raj Purohit and his personal security officer, reached the BMC, but the security staff did not recognize him and insisted on seeing his identity card.Though Mehta stayed calm, there was a commotion as BJP workers lodged a protest. Peace was restored only after additional municipal commissioner Sanjay Deshmukh rushed to the entry gate and tendered an apology to the cabinet member. But this was not the first time that Mehta had faced such a situation. After being sworn in as a cabinet member and taking charge of the housing and labour portfolio, Mehta was expecting a customary briefing by senior bureaucrats of two departments. While labour department officials submitted a comprehensive note to Mehta, no one turned up from Mhada, the agency responsible for implementing the state's affordable housing plan. Mehta was further stunned when he was not invited for Mhada's board meeting. He got another shock when a Mhada bureaucrat, who had recently been shifted to Mantralaya, refused to recognize the cabinet member's authority . Mehta felt that only time could be the answer to situations and hence did not react or complain to the chief minister . But he lost his cool when the housing secretary's office gave him false information. Mehta was told that the housing secretary was with the chief secretary , whereas that day , the chief secretary was in New Delhi. When brought to chief minister Devendra Fadnavis's notice, he quietly shifted the bureaucrat to another department.
A logical end
In October 2002, a visit to the peon quarters at the Raj Bhavan had taken the then governor Mohammed Fazal by shock. The building was dilapidated and shabby without any ventilation. Fazal had immediately summoned the then chief minister, chief secretary and bureaucrats of the public works and public health departments. He had brought to their notice that while he was living in a palatial bungalow overlooking the Arabian Sea, his staff was living in inhumane conditions.Fazal had given instructions to the then chief minister to reconstruct all the quarters, particularly those of the Class III and IV staff, and that too in a time-bound period. After Fazal's term expired in 2004, Raj Bhavan employees assumed that the project would be forgotten. However, Fazal's successor and former Karnataka chief minister S M Krishna too pursued the proposal, followed by S C Jamir and K Sankaranarayanan. When C Vidyasagar Rao took over last year, he reviewed the pending works and found that the Raj Bhavan quarters project had reached the final stage but needed a push. He immediately stepped in and asked the PWD to expedite the project.Rao and chief minister Devendra Fadnavis handed over the keys to the employees on May 26, when Narendra Modi completed one year in office.
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