After sweeping the Bihar elections, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar tells Business Standard that the main task before him is to tackle corruption and ensure fast economic growth. Excerpts from an interview:
During the election campaign, you promised to keep tabs on corruption. How are you going to do this?
Well, our target is to eliminate corruption from the state. For this, we have been doing a lot of work. During our previous stint, we passed an anti-corruption Act.
Under the Act, properties of corrupt officials can be seized by the state government and turned into schools. This time also, we are actively involved in making special laws and putting in place special provisions to control corruption.
We are in the process of drafting a Right to Service Bill. To curb corruption in local bodies, a Lokpal will be appointed. The important thing is that today there is a structure and willingness within the state government to curb corruption. Other things will fall in line.
What is this right to service?
It is going to be the biggest administrative reform in Bihar. During my Vishwas Yatras, I saw that people had to make numerous rounds of government offices for the simplest of jobs.
That is why we took this innovative step. According to the provisions of this Bill, simple works like issuing caste certificates, character certificates, medical certificates, birth or death certificates and passports will have to done in set time.
If the work is not done within the deadline, the official concerned will be fined. One of the most important provisions is that the fine will be deducted from the official’s salary. These are small steps but will create a huge impact.
We are also planning to take the help of information technology later. We feel that people should not have to visit government offices for these simple things.
There are many complaints about the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) in the state. What do you have to say about that?
There are indeed many constraints here. The biggest problem is the limited flow of money from New Delhi. We came to power in November 2005 and found that the previous government had not provided utilisation certificates for many projects.
The Centre is demanding these for sending the money. How can one justify that? However, we are providing them the certificates, but still the central government is not giving us the money.
On the other hand, there’s a shortage of technical staff and rozgaar sewaks. One important thing is the number of days of employment.
NERGS does promise 100 days employment a year, but the money allocated to us can provide employment for just 30-35 days.