Dear Comrades,
With arrest of one
official of Utkal University MDG on 23.06.2012 by RPF, Bhubaneswar on alleged
malpractice of Tatkal railway tickets in the PRS counter, this Division has now
faced two such incidents continuously, first being the case of BJB Nagar S O
issue of the high-handedness of outside authorities on India Post and its
employees. It is much regretted to say that without prior sanction of our competent
authority, outside authorities are in practice of entering our premises/offices
and taking our officials to their custody.
Under Section 19 of
the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, it is necessary for the prosecuting
authority to have the previous sanction of the appropriate administrative
authority for launching prosecution against a public servant. The sanction for
prosecution of any person, who is or was a Judge or Magistrate or a public
servant not removable from his office save by or with the sanction of the
Government, is also necessary, under section 197(1) of the code of Criminal
Procedure, 1973, if he is accused of any offence alleged to have been committed
by him while acting or purporting to act in the discharge of official duty.
Sub-section (2) of
section 19 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 further provides that
where for any reason whatsoever any doubt arises as to whose previous sanction
should be obtained under sub-section (1), the sanction shall be given by the
authority which would have been competent to remove the public servant from his
office at the time when the offence was alleged to have been committed.
If the prior sanction
of the competent authority is not obtained, the trial would be ab initio void and if commenced will
have to be set aside. A fresh prosecution would be necessary after a proper
sanction has been obtained and a charge-sheet against the accused will need to
be filed afresh for his trial for offence covered by the sanction.
But we are sorry to
note that in both the incidents happened in Bhubaneswar Division, we find
serious violation of the above acts and rules ( enunciated in Chapter VII of
Vigilance Manual) by the outside authorities taking our officials into task. We
apprehend, this may be a trend in future that any outside authority with whom
the Department has made an agreement to run the former’s business through the
vast network of India Post may at any time rush to any post office and behave
with the staff members at his sweet will neither informing our authorities nor
obtaining prior sanction as required under rules. Time will come when SBI,
NABARAD, HDFC Bank, WUFC, HMT, Life Insurance and Mutual Fund companies etc.
whose products and services are handled by India Post will raid post offices and
handover our employees to police custody. Thus, the security of the staff
members has now been a question in India Post.
With serious
resentment on such deliberate violation of the agreement between India Post and
Indian Railway by the RPF, Bhubaneswar and violation to above acts / rules, we
have registered our reaction before the Divisional administration and requested
our Circle Union and CHQ for similar actions before appropriate authorities.
While the actions taken by our Circle Union and CHQ are not known to us, we are
happy that our Divisional administration has taken a strong step in protesting
such irregular action of the railway authorities. With sincere thanks to the
SSPOs, Bhubaneswar, we would like to reproduce Divisional Office letter written
to DRM, ECoR, Khurda Road Division.
Government of India
Department of Posts
Office of the Senior Superintendent
of Post Offices
Bhubaneswar Division,
Bhubaneswar-751009
No.
F-VII/98/2012,
Dated
at Bhubaneswar the 25.06.2012
To
The Divisional Railway Manager
East Coast Railway, Khurda Road Division
At/Po : Jatani, Dist : Khurda
Sub : Prosecution
of Sri Malay Ranjan Pati, Postal Asst., Utkal University MDG on alleged
malpractice in PRS counter on 23.06.2012.
Sir,
I would like to bring your kind notice that the India Post PRS counter
(computerized passenger reservation system) was opened at Utkal University
Mukhya Dak Ghar, Bhubaneswar with an agreement signed on 4th
January, 2011 by the senior officers of both the Department of Indian Railways
and India Post. Accordingly, Sri Malay Ranjan Pati, Postal Asst., Utkal
University MDG was entrusted the duty of PRS counter as being imparted with
necessary training for the same.
On
23.06.2012, a joint team consisting of CIB / RPF / KUR and RPF Post,
Bhubaneswar raided the Utkal University MDG at about 08.00 AM and finding some
irregularity at the PRS counter, they took the Postal Asst. Sri Pati into their
custody and arrested him under section 179 of Railway Act. Due to arrest and
taking into custody of the Postal Asst., the Post Office has suffered a lot in
fulfilling the need of the customers of the Department since Sri Pati was
assigned with other Postal work in addition to the duty of PRS. The team also
did not feel to intimate the situation on the very day of incident to the
undersigned, who is the competent authority of the alleged official. It
is reliably learnt that the RPF had earlier attempted two times to nab the
official, but had failed due to insufficient evidence. Now the question is, if
the RPF authority could have gathered so much information about malpractice at
PRS counter, Utkal University MDG, they must have apprised their higher
authority and since the system of PRS is a joint venture by both the
Department, then the Railway authority would have no hesitation to intimate the
fact to the higher authority of the Department of Posts or to the undersigned
so that a remedial / preventive action could have been taken much earlier by
this Department for eliminating the present situation. Even before arresting
the official and taking him into custody the undersigned was not informed and
kept in darkness of the entire scenario. Prior arrangement to manage the work
of the absentee could not be made also. Due to such motivated action of the RPF
authority without giving prior information and without taking the Postal
authorities into confidence, the department not only loose its image before the
public but also put into the crisis of shortage of staff to manage the PRS
counter and the postal business attached to the branch. Now as per the rule of
the govt. the official may be put into suspension causing unnecessary payment
of subsistence allowance without extracting any work from him. Therefore, was
it not wise to inform the authorities of the Dept of posts about the matter
when it came to the notice of the RPF/Railway authorities before taking the
recourse of arresting the official with proof. Had this been done the
unwarranted situation like this could have been averted by not putting any harm
to both the departments. By such action of the RPF/Railway authority, the very
provisions made in Para – 16.5 of agreement on PRS at Utkal University Mukhya
Dak Ghar signed by both the Department on 4th January, 2011 is
violated.
Therefore, it is requested to
take stock of the situation and issue appropriate instruction to the concerned
authorities as deemed proper at the earliest.
Yours faithfully
(A.K.Nayak)
Sr. Supdt. of Post Offices
Bhubaneswar Division
Bhubaneswar-751009
Copy to :
1.
Senior Divisional Security Commandant (RPF), East Coast Railway, Khurda Road
Division, At/Po : Jatani, Dist : Khurda for favour of kind information and
immediate necessary action.
2.
The Asst. Postmaster General (Vig), O/o the Chief Postmaster General, Odisha
Circle, Bhubaneswar-751001 for information and necessary action.
3.
The Asst. Director (BD), O/o the Chief Postmaster General, Odisha Circle,
Bhubaneswar-751001 for information and necessary action.
(A.K.Nayak)
Sr. Supdt. of Post Offices
Bhubaneswar Division
Bhubaneswar-751009
