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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Police rider on NREGS FIRs by Bhanu Pratap Singh

Police rider on NREGS FIRs by Bhanu Pratap Singh

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published Published on Apr 22, 2011   modified Modified on Apr 22, 2011
The Sirohi police have decided not to register FIRs over irregularities committed in Mahatma Gandhi National Rrural Employment Guarantee Schemes (MGNREGS) unless the complaint is backed by an audit report.

Superintendent of police for Sirohi, Vipul Chaturvedi passed a written order to this effect for all police station in-charges in the district during a law and order meeting held on March 13, 2011. "Cases shall not be registered against people who commit irregularities under the MGNREGS unless the FIRs are accompanied by reports of clear embezzlement established by the audit teams concerned," reads the order.

Even as the social organisations working in the field of MGNRES have deplored the order, the senior police officer insists his order was "in accordance with the law of the land". "There is no provision under the Indian penal code ( IPC) for registering FIRs over complaints of irregularities'. It is a job of the government departments concerned, and not the police, to investigate irregularities," Chaturvedi says.

The cop differentiates between an "irregularity" and a "crime" while considering whether an FIR can be registered related to the employment scheme. "The audit report should first establish that an irregularity has been committed, then only the police can act," reasons Chaturvedi. He adds, "Complaints of irregularities can be investigated by the anti-corruption bureau but certainly not by the police."

The Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan's (MKSS) Nikhil Dey, on the other hand, believes the police officer's order was wrong. "How can he pass such an order? There are hundreds of irregularities that won't come up in the audit report. The police cannot decline to register FIRs in such cases," says the member of the MKSS, which played a key role in shaping the MGNREGA.

Pointing out some of the most common irregularities committed under the MGNREGS, Dey says, "Wages released against fake signatures in a muster-roll is an irregularity that cannot be detected in an audit report. But the police have to register an FIR against such a complaint and carry out investigations." Similarly, fake accounts opened to embezzle MGNREGS money cannot be detected by an audit report. "An audit, at best, can tell whether an expenditure that is being claimed have been incurred or not," he says.

The district SP, however, maintains that irregularities going undetected by audit reports need to be inquired and established by the departments concerned. "There are thousands of signatures on the muster-rolls and the police cannot be expected to cross-check them. Either the MGNREGS department or the panchayati raj department should establish such irregularities. The police can register an FIR only after that," asserts Chaturvedi.

The Times of India, 22 April, 2011, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/jaipur/Police-rider-on-NREGS-FIRs/articleshow/8051217.cms


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