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Protect honest officers: IAS officers’ body to govt

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New Delhi, Sep 11 (PTI) The honest IAS officers and theirbonafide decisions need to be protected so that they do notshy away from taking administrative decisions, a bodyrepresenting them said today. It also asked the Centre to revoke the suspension ofsenior IAS officer G K Dwivedi which has led to demoralizationin the rank and file of the officers working in the centralsecretariat. "Dwivedi is known for his integrity and hard work. In hislast two years of his tenure he has implemented about 17important initiatives of the government," said the central IASofficers’ association, which represents over 4,900 members ofthe prestigious service working across the country. Dwivedi, along with three of his junior officers in HomeMinistry, was suspended after it was noticed that the licenseof an NGO of controversial Islamic preacher Zakir Naik toreceive foreign grant was renewed by a departmental unitheaded by him. A delegation of the association met Minister of State forPersonnel Jitendra Singh to raise various such issuesconcerning them and sought protection to all civil servants. It expressed concern that due to lack of legalprotection, inadequacy in law, the officers are facing greatdifficulties apart from huge financial loss in fighting thelegal cases and also the "social stigma". The association cited legal cases against former TelecomSecretary Shyamal Ghosh, former coal secretaries P C Parekhand H C Gupta, former IAS officer in Space Ministry Veena Raoand few others, "all of whom are known to be officers of goodreputation and are now retired". These officers are allegedly facing legal cases regardingalleged irregularities in second generation (2G) spectrum,coal blocks allocations and Antrix-Devas deal. "The central IAS association urged the government ofIndia to protect the honest and sincere officers for takingbonafide decisions in public interest so that they donÂ’t feelshy or edgy in taking bold and innovative decisions," saidSanjay Bhoosreddy, secretary of the association. The association said there is an urgent need to revisitthe anti-corruption law and the legislation governing criminalprocedure and suggested to the government that protectionshould be available to both the working and retired officers,irrespective of the civil service he or she belongs to. The officers have also sought appropriate legalassistance for fighting court cases, as per the memorandumgiven to the Minister. While assuring the officers that government is seriouslykeen to make sure that IAS officersÂ’ initiative is notdeterred on any count, Singh said, the Prevention ofCorruption (Amendment) Bill, 2013 pending in Parliament alsotakes care of many of these aspects. He said, for example, the provision to prosecute anofficer, which was earlier available only at the level ofJoint Secretary and above, is now sought to be made applicablein case of officers at every level. There are 4,926 IAS officers in the country. PTI AKVRG

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