Gurugram: Five days after he was posted as commissioner, Karnal division, Haryana IAS officer Vijay Singh Dahiya, who is out on bail in a case of alleged bribery, has been shifted out. He will now serve as commissioner and secretary to the government of Haryana in the archive department.
Dahiya got bail on 28 November 2023, after spending almost 50 days in jail, and was subsequently reinstated.
His appointment as commissioner for the Karnal division, which comprises the district where Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s assembly segment is located, immediately after his reinstatement had raised eyebrows.
According to the transfer orders issued by the Haryana government Saturday, Dahiya, a 2001-batch IAS officer, will relieve senior IAS officer Ashok Khemka (1991 batch) of the charge of commissioner and secretary in the archive department. Khemka is the additional chief secretary in the department.
Meanwhile, Renu Phulia, commissioner for the Ambala division, has been given additional charge of Karnal division.
Contacted by ThePrint for comment, a senior officer in the Haryana government described Dahiya’s shift as a “routine transfer”.
Dahiya was arrested by the Haryana Anti-corruption Bureau (ACB) in October last year in a case of alleged bribery registered in April. He was the commissioner and secretary of the state youth empowerment and entrepreneurship department at the time.
According to the ACB, he is under investigation for allegedly seeking Rs 5 lakh in bribe for clearing payments of Rs 50 lakh to a skill centre under the Haryana Skill Development Mission, which was overseen by his department.
Attempts were made to get a comment from Dahiya but his mobile phone was not reachable. In his bail plea, the IAS officer had said that his name had been illegally included as accused even though there was neither any evidence of demand of a bribe, nor acceptance.
No preliminary inquiry was made to ascertain the facts before the FIR was filed, he added.
‘Shocking’
Haryana-based political analyst Pawan Kumar Bansal, author of ‘Gustakhi Maaf, Haryana’, a book on state politics, said the posting of Dahiya as the Karnal division commissioner was “shocking”.
“Vijay Singh Dahiya was arrested under the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act for accepting a bribe from a firm to clear its bills when he was commissioner and secretary of the skills development department, Haryana,” he added.
“Under Section 17-A of the PC Act, the government’s sanction is required for prosecuting a public servant. The power of granting such sanction is delegated to the divisional commissioner. It was really shocking to see the Haryana government posting a person facing corruption charges in a post where they decide the fate of others booked for similar allegations,” he said.
Bansal also said that Dahiya’s second posting order “has been issued in such a hurry” that the state government appointed Renu Phulia, who is already commissioner, Ambala division, had been given the additional charge of Karmal, instead of finding an officer who could exclusively serve that role.
“The commissioner of a division is a very responsible post and the officer has to look after 4 to 5 districts. Yet, the government has given the charge of Karnal division to the commissioner of the Ambala division because the government acted in a hurry after realising that posting Dahiya as a divisional commissioner, and that too in Khattar’s constituency, was a huge blunder,” said Bansal.
Political analyst Hemant Atri said posting a person reinstated 10 days back in a division housing the chief minister’s district was either an act of ignorance or of overconfidence.
“Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar always claims that he has zero tolerance against corruption. But Dahiya’s posting in Khattar’s own constituency was giving off exactly the opposite meaning,” said Atri.
(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)
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