Thursday

Corruption behind the walls

RDS Times
www.rdstimes.blogspot.com
By: Shamsuddin Muhammad
According to the media reports, corruption has got its way to every nook and corner of the country during its journey for more than six decades. There is hardly any institution or organizational structure which can be taken as an ideal entity. Despite of efforts of every new government to hinder corrupt practices, any tengible outcome could be resulted from; rather the menace of corrupt practices were given formal justification. On political front, politics its self has become the dirty game as it gets inspiration from the political pattern prevailing in the rest of the country. Majority of politicians have had involved in back kicks and their focus revolves around personal gains as they have their own axes to grind for they know that the voters who support them and get them entered into legislative bodies in elections are nothing but irrational breed who can be tricked using different tools like arousing communal and cultural hatred among
them to achieve their end-that is to preserve their seats. Lets first put a glance over the common observation of prevailing norms in public oranizations. According to a police peronnel, recruitment procedures are being ignored on non-gazatted posts like that of constables and head constables in police department which according to him needs at least fourty thousand rupee as a driving force to get the file approached to the authorities; similarly, the department for a common man is known as currency minting area for it has influence in dailylives of the people. The case with revenue, civil supply, building and construction and rest of the service departments is no different. The patwaries, the legacy of British imperial yolk who come under the command of assistant commissioners even bypass their bosses in dispensation of their services to get extra charges, skillfully; so here too, the additional charges or Nazrana is a minor practice.
There are numerous departments indireclty involved corrupt practices, though few legitimized by powerful establishments. A for as bureaucratical nuances and intrasies in the region of Gilgit-Baltistan are concerned, they can be clearly discerned through a close observation. A German sociologist Max Weber was the first social scientist to coin the term bureacracy in the as a response to the then tyranical and despotic rule in Europe. He identified at least five attributes of such a rule including: individual subjugation, cruelty, subjective judgment, favoritism and unwavering loyality to the sovereign. The presented his own modle that emphasized on division of work, rigid heirarchical system, abidance to the rules and regulations; he described buruatical model as most effective organizational structure against monarchical rule.He attributed bureaucracy with some of its qualities: professionalism, rigidity , importance to structuralism and bossism which proved its defects later. The biggest shortcoming in this model that brought the model under fire or severe criticism was was negligence of human factor as he did not elaborate any thing regarding role of human relations and excessive importance to structure and procedure. The phenomenon of bureaucracy emerged rapidly after second world war due to expansion in the activities of states as the bureaucracy was considered as one of the most efficient and well structure organization as compared to the others.Yet, due to lack to constant check and lack of acumen among political representations, most of the bureaucracies suffered from corruption, nepotism and proto typed rather than proactive attitude based on scientific research. The phenomenon of bureaucracy in the whole country is a complex case to elaborate in few lines, instead we should focus on the irregularities prevailing in Gilgit-Baltistan region.According to media reports, the irregularities and back door accesses are on apex in services structure. According to an official on the condition of anonymity claimed that the recruitment and promotion rules are largely being ignored. According to him, promotion on scale 14 to 16 are subjected to approval of authorities and is based on a particular policy; but what is happening is beyond imagination. An official of grade fourteen, who is affiliated with a national media has been given promotion from grade 14 to 16 within one year of his appointment and now proposed to grade seventeen withing few months which is a tangible evidence of corruption on different levels. He according to him, promotions are backed by communal polarization means a member of a specific community though competent enough may loss if he does not enjoy the backing of a powerful community. There are thousands of cases out of record when deserved were pushed back to give way to one who have some influenced recommendation though incompetent enought to despense his duties. The menace of corruption has infused so rapidly into very fabric of every walk of life in the country in general and and Gilgit-Baltistan in general that there seems no way to get out of it.The review of such cases elucidates that rate of irregularities have been increased rapidly.
Since 1990's, the time of the then Chief Executive of Gilgit-Baltistan Assembly, Fida Muhammad Nashad to the contemporary government, despite tall claims the menance continues to dominate
processes from bottom to top in different forms direct or directly. The newly ellected Chief Miniter, Syed Mehdi Shah, like his predecessors has pledged to root out the dillema following his oath. Nevertheless, the cases of irregularities on poromotions and other processes implies the lake of political will. Such cases of irregularities portray where we are heading. In private sector, we can observe numerous examples where Non- Governmental Organizations are hoodwinking doners and donner agencies against fake developmental projects which serves to achieve their end-that is an impressive photography, though not necessarily it relates in order to get economic
incentives in the name of humanitarian work. It seems nothing could work to stop it except a revolution that will change the dynamics of so called development on part of humanity in developing countries in particular. We would like to appeal those on helms of affairs to take immediate notice to the irregularities to ensure appointments and promotions based on merit and competence. We hope the high ups will make efforts to eliminate every source of corruption to create better society and help ensure euality. In the last, it can be expected that federal government will appoint a competent and accommodating local person in either sex having exposure of problem solution abilities in hard times as well as sense of miseries of the poor population of the region.












The writer is editor of Voice of Hunza, Gilgit-Baltistan Echo, Rds Times, Silk Route Times and Bi-Monthly Alshams. He can be reached at: jaashams@gmail.com

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