A little over a fortnight after Dinesh Afzulpurkar took over as chief secretary, the CBI filed an FIR charging him with leasing prime property at throwaway prices to former Union minister Bansi Lal's daughter-in-law and office-bearer of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee, Kiran Chaudhary.
This was one thing the Shiv Sena BJP combine could well do without, especially because the saffron brigade holds up the alleged 'corruption' of Sharad Pawar as a major poll plank. Chief Minister Manohar Joshi and Deputy Chief Minister Gopinath Munde have both been cornered into telling the legislature that Afzulpurkar would be ousted if found guilty. Agreeing that the charges against the chief secretary were "of a serious nature", Joshi declared that Afzulpurkar would not remain chief secretary "even for a minute" if the charges against him were proved.
The Maharashtra government went ahead with the decision to appoint Afzulpurkar, erstwhile chairman of the Mumbai Port Trust (MPT), as chief secretary, ignoring the Centre's warning that the CBI was probing two charges against him. He was appointed on February 24, and the CBI filed its FIR on March 13 in Bombay under the Prevention of Corruption Act and the Indian Penal Code, accusing Afzulpurkar and the MPT Vice-Chairman B.P. Pandey of fraudulently allotting MPT property at a paltry sum to Delhi socialite and lawyer Chaudhary.
She was allotted prime office space in Imperial Chambers, a building at Ballard Estate in south Bombay at Rs 57.20 per sq metre. According to the FIR, this was increased to Rs 542.57 per sq metre when Afzulpurkar found out that the Ministry of Surface Transport was conducting an inquiry into the allotment. Says the FIR: "Such manoeuvres have only reinforced the incriminating factors against Afzulpurkar." The chief secretary has also been accused of flouting the ministry's guidelines which stipulate that such allotments should be made to private parties by auction alone and at prices relating to the market rates in the area.
Chaudhary was engaged by the MPT to look after legal matters when Jagdish Tytler was minister for surface transport. She is known to be close to Tytler. The FIR alleges that since July 1993, Afzulpurkar, Chaudhary and Pandey engineered a deal causing a loss of several crores to the MPT: "Afzulpurkar and Pandey acted in a manner inimical to the financial interests of the MPT."
Quick to capitalise on it, the Congress and the Janata Dal have demanded the ouster of the chief secretary. Says PCC Vice-President Kripa Shankar Singh: "This will certainly be an election issue for us. They talk of the Congress’ corruption but who have they appointed?" Many in the BJP agree that Afzulpurkar should not have been appointed chief secretary. But the party has been forced to defend a decision attributed to Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray.
Says BJP stalwart Pramod Mahajan: "Could Afzulpurkar (then MPTchairman) ask his master (Jagdish Tytler) for money?" Accusing Prime Minister Narasimha Rao of 'blackmail', Mahajan argues: "As long as Afzulpurkar was in the Centre's service, he was honest; once he moved to the state, has he become dishonest? This inquiry has been pending for the last three years—this is a political move as in the cases of Kalpnath Rai and Brij Bhushan Sharan."
Mahajan will soon have to think up a fresh defence when the CBI files its next FIR against the chief secretary which relates to the licensing of a berth to American President Lines (APL). For now, Afzulpurkar has done his bit in self-defence. Before he took over as chief secretary, he put out an an advertisement in the newspapers which said: "The CBI verified two actions of the Mumbai Port Trust of 1993-94—one relating to the licensing of a berth to APL and the other relating to a lease of a small office space to its own advocates, Kiran Chaudhary and Co. The licensing of a berth to APL was done by following all canons of administrative and financial propriety, total transparency and after following established procedures. APL's selection was through an open advertisement. This was an experiment in accordance with the policy guidelines of the ministry of surface transport."
The question now is whether Afzulpurkar's defence will satisfy the CBI enough to bail him out.
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