<<Citizen Selection Procedure

Click on the names to view details

Raaj Mangal Prasad
Citizen-nominee for RTI Awards 2009 2009
Reference Number: C1062
Age: 49
Gender: Male
Organization: Pratidhi, a Delhi-based NGO.
Nominated by: self
Why is he short-listed for RTI Awards 2009?
For his efforts to use RTI Act 2005 to expose how Delhi government officials siphoned off crores of rupees meant for children homes, squalor and neglect in those homes, and government’s pathetic performance in complying with Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2000.
Prasad used RTI to conduct an investigation over several years to show that officials of Delhi government’s Social Welfare Department used forged quotations with inflated prices to steal money meant for buying food and clothing for inmates of 24 children homes.
The department, for example, spent Rs 42 lakh on just seven children in a year in one of the children homes run by it, showed documents obtained through RTI, even as inmates of those homes lived in want and squalor.
Prasad used the incriminating documents to compel the anti-corruption branch of Delhi’s Directorate of Vigilance to take action against officials stealing public funds.
The action that followed led to arrests of nine Class-I officials, including two Joint Directors of Social Welfare Department, and a couple of private suppliers.
Prasad also filed a writ petition at Delhi High Court, which resulted in Delhi government scrapping the corrupted system of procurement for children homes in favour of uniform and single-source procurement.
Prasad also used RTI to expose Delhi government’s remissness in complying with Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2000, and pushed it to expedite setting up of a mandatory fund, registration of institutions, and functioning of child welfare committees.
He similarly exposed Delhi government’s poor compliance with Child Labour Act 1986, and conducted several other probes that nailed failure, neglect and corruption in social welfare.
Prasad has used RTI and the Media successfully to shine light on the racket that government’s social welfare has been reduced to. His effort also suggests that once exposed this racket becomes much easier to smash up.

Details of the nomination

Prasad, who hails from East Champaran district of Bihar, first came to Delhi in 1976. After completing his BA (political science) and MA (social work) at Delhi University, he worked for four years for UN High Commission for Refugees in a program meant to help international refugees in India.
Later he also worked on a project of International Labour Organization (ILO) to promote small businesses in Delhi’s slums, during which time he came in contact with several NGOs.
In 1993, Prasad and some of his friends from Delhi School of Social Work, set up Association for Development (AFD), their own NGO, with the aim to work for victims of crimes, especially women and children.
In 1995, AFD got a rare opportunity to work in collaboration with Delhi Police on a project to help and rehabilitate crime victims. The project was called Pratidhi, meaning hope.
Project Pratidhi, which would later grow into an organization in its own right, allowed Prasad to enjoy vital police support in his effort to get rights of crime victims recognized.
In 2001, Prasad and his colleagues at Pratidhi started work to understand the condition of street children in Delhi, some of whom had stayed in and escaped from shelters directly run by social welfare department of Delhi government.
Those children spoke of squalor and abuse in government-run shelters.
Prasad then used Delhi Right to Information Act 2001 to try to lift the veil from the goings-on at children homes and other institutions run by social welfare department – without much success.
In January 2006, Prasad filed his first application under the newly enacted RTI Act, 2005, at social welfare department to demand copies of quotations for food, medicines, and other items purchased by children and observation homes in the year 2004-05. He subsequently filed more applications for purchases made in other years.
His requests met with much stonewalling, which is hardly surprising as the PIO and appellate authority at the department would later turn out to be among the swindlers of public funds.
Copies of a few quotations that came out early showed all signs of a big fraud – interesting enough stuff for Prasad to try to get the Media involved. In March 2006, Hindustan Times carried a four-column report with headline: ‘Government orders lingerie for boys’ home’.
The government, predictably, acted blind to that report.
By the end of 2006, Central Information Commission’s orders and warnings had compelled the department to share copies of thousands of quotations, details of items purchased, and comparative statements, whose reading helped Prasad and his team form a clearer idea of how officials were siphoning off money meant to purchase goods for needy children.
By that time, Media had been wholeheartedly covering the unfolding scandal.
The quotations invariably contained commodities with prices much higher than retail prices in the market. They also contained stuff that had no use for inmates, such as female undergarments for boys home! Many of the quotations were then checked with the suppliers and were found to be fake.
One of the shelters had spent Rs 42 lakh on just seven children in a year.
Armed with the incriminating documents, Prasad then tried to get Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB), which functions under Delhi government’s Directorate of Vigilance, to book the embezzling officials. There too he faced obstructions.
It was only in 2008, when an upright person took over as Additional Commissioner of Police, ACB, that an honest investigation of the roles of corrupt officials began, says Prasad.
In June 2008, ACB conducted raids at 12 places to recover evidence of forgery in procurement.
By October 2008, ACB had arrested several officials, including Sanjay Gihar, former Joint Director at social welfare department who had since been transferred to Municipal Corporation of Delhi, M.J.N. Tadu, Superintendent of Home for Mentally Retarded Persons at Asha Kiran Complex-Rohini, and P. Anand Rao, superintendent of Children Home for Boys-Narela.
In all, nine class-I officers have been arrested, as also a high-profile tout who was behind most of the purchases based on fake quotations.
A writ petition, filed by Prasad, prompted Delhi High Court to order Delhi government to “streamline” the procurement of goods for children homes.
In March 2009, Delhi government acknowledged the “difficulties” and corruption in its system of procurement of commodities for the shelters and decided to replace it with a uniform, single-source system of procurement.
In another investigation, Prasad used RTI to demand to know whether Delhi government had yet complied with Juvenile Justice (care and protection of children) Act 2000 in terms of setting up child welfare fund and completing the process of inspection and registration of institutions within statutory timeframe.
While the replies from the government showed that they had hardly done anything, Prasad forced the issue through CIC over eight months to compel the government to set up the fund as well as expedite the process of inspecting and registering institutions.
Prasad similarly obtained information on Delhi government’s pathetic performance in rescuing child labour employed in dhabas, restaurants, and households, and reasons behind lack of progress in prosecution of offenders.
He then fed the information to the Media to start a public debate and bring societal pressure to bear on the government.
Prasad also used RTI to learn more about suspected torture and death of an inmate of a beggar home in Delhi and used the information to prevent the authorities from hushing up the matter.
In another investigation, Prasad found through a series of RTI applications that the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) appointed in 2007, on the recommendations of then minister for women and child development, two clearly unqualified people as members of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR), a statutory body that has been set up through an Act of Parliament.
Those political appointments were in clear contravention of the provisions of the Act.
In a related probe, Prasad found that in March 2009, a couple of days before the code of conduct for Lok Sabha elections came into force, PMO had again approved the appointment of 4 more dubiously qualified persons as members of NCPCR on the recommendations of the same minister.
Those four appointments later did run up against the election code of conduct.
Prasad has conducted several more probes to expose governmental corruption and incompetence in administering social welfare, with satisfying support from the Media.
Prasad has achieved significant success in using RTI and the Media to bring the guarded and shadowy world of social welfare into public knowledge. His work has also contributed to compelling government to perform its duties and become more accountable for its actions.
He now wants social workers in other states to use wholeheartedly this strategy of forcing improvement in the system.