How low would a person have to sink to seek a 'cut' from the money being handed over to a rape survivor?
Vinod Bhosale, an official from the Women and Child Welfare department, no less, could have the answer to that question. He was caught red-handed trying to extract Rs 20,000 from a rape survivor to hand over her Rs 50,000 cheque under a government scheme to aid victims of such crimes.
What's even worse is that Bhosale is just one of 83 government officials, figuring on a list compiled by the state Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), who were caught red handed and arrested for taking bribes in 2014 from the poorest of the poor to give them the benefits they are entitled to under various government schemes.
ACB officials say the details of these cases are meant to give a clearer picture of how the benefits from various government schemes meant for people living below the poverty line either fail to reach them in full or are made available to them after a long delay.
AMAZED
According to ACB officials, there are around 38 different government schemes to give subsidies and other benefits to people living below the poverty line. Of these, the main schemes are Employment Generation Scheme, Indira Avas Yojana, Ekatmik Vikas Yojana, Rajeev Gandhi Health Scheme and others related to goat farming, water supply and tap connection. There are also schemes for rape victims, dalits, slum dwellers etc.
"The schemes are meant for very poor people that need the government's help to improve their quality of life and these officers demand money even from them to get the benefits of the schemes. Some of the complainants have approached us from faraway places like Gadchiroli, Chandrapur, Washim, Yavatmal and Amravati, and we have arrested the accused," said Pravin Dixit, Director General of Police, ACB, Maharashtra.
SPARING NO ONE
ACB officials said they were shocked when they found doctors, health officers and even a school principal indulging in such activities. "One government officer demanded money to release cheques for building toilets in a village in Nashik. The gramsevak was arrested while taking Rs 600 from the complainant to release his cheques. A doctor was also arrested for demanding R400 from poor elderly women for giving them spectacles under the government's health scheme," said Dixit.
"They (corrupt babus) don't understand that such schemes are meant for very poor people who don't have food or employment and make do with the money they get for whatever days they can get employment through government schemes. The corrupt officials demand cuts even from them. We had published our numbers in such areas and that's how the complainants approached us," said the official.
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