The Hindu Business Line : Bane of awards

GENERAL prudence, and the prescription about Caesar's wife being above suspicion, demand that Constitutional functionaries should on no account be seen to be putting themselves under the obligation of anyone, least of all actual or potential favour-seekers, influence-peddlers and business persons. Indeed, they should keep themselves at a safe distance from situations that can raise in the people's minds the slightest uneasiness about the possibility of their being manipulated or their independence and neutrality being compromised. This applies to the members of the Election Commission, the Public Service Commissions, the Comptroller and Auditor-General, the Chief Vigilance Commissioner and, of course, the Judges. Ideally, these functionaries should not be members of clubs, nor participate in public functions that have nothing to do with their official duties, nor hobnob socially with persons of doubtful credentials.

Unfortunately, adherence to such rigorous self-discipline is no longer the norm. Quite the contrary. Members of the higher judiciary are known to accept invitations for inaugurating commercial establishments and the hospitality and travel arrangements made for them and members of their families by persons who may have an axe to grind. One chief justice went so far as to pocket a disproportionately large amount in foreign currency ostensibly paid by a publisher for a book.

A common lure dangled before weak-minded personages by various organisations is the conferment of awards bearing high-sounding names supposedly in recognition of distinguished services. Most of the persons are chosen for such awards when they are in positions of authority, and pleasing them may be thought to be good investment for possible future contingencies. One of the persons who was the recipient of many awards bestowed on him by different kinds of associations was arrested inside his own office and charge-sheeted as an accused in a case of bribery and money-laundering. Thus, it came as a shock to find that the Chief Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) had also fallen for this ploy by accepting an award in the name of a politician who was of no very great effulgence in public esteem in or outside his State. Far from adding any glory, the name of the award itself is apt to detract from the credibility and sanctity of the CVC's role. At a time when even the Bharat Ratna and Padma awards are getting into disrepute because of the patent unworthiness of some individuals included in the roll of honour, and when professional badges of recognition which carry the imprimatur of institutions of eminence under the aegis of Government and for which the screening process is presumed to be very strict are not taken at face value in certain questionable cases, the best course for public functionaries is to resist the temptation of receiving unofficial awards at all times.

B. S. Raghavan

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