Rampant corruption in Assam! Retired employees give bribe at DHE office to get pension: CM

Jan. 21: The society has as if lost all morality. There is rampant corruption at many places. Those working in education department has to give bribe at the office of the Director of Higher Education (DHE) in order to get his/ her pension papers approved. This was stated by Chief Minister Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma during his speech at the 29 Foundation Day of Assam University, Silchar on Friday.

Dwelling on the issue of corruption, the Chief Minister said, “A few days ago, we had a meeting at the Assam Secretariat on how we can make a best government by disposing off all pending files and augmenting a positive work culture in the state. In short, we wanted to dwell upon good governance. What I found then was that those officers who were on the verge of their retirement wanted to complete making their pension papers on the day of their retirement. So out of curiosity, I asked them the reason for the hurry for I felt that these works could be done even a day later. I was surprised to learn from them that after retirement none will recognise them and do their work.”

Live from Assam University, Silchar. https://t.co/NoUT1tE4wq

— Himanta Biswa Sarma (@himantabiswa) January 21, 2022

Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma said, “I was surprised to learn that after dedicating 30 years of service in an office, the colleagues along with whom an employee worked will not recognise him/her post-retirement. So the employees don’t have that confidence whether his colleagues would come forward and make the pension papers smoothly!” Citing an example, Dr Sarma said, “Let us for instance think that an employee of Assam University gets retired. After that the retired employee may have to give money to his former colleagues to get his pension done.” He also said, “A retired policeman in order to get his pension has to give bribe to another policeman!”

The Chief Minister then went on to say that, “An employee of education department when gets retired has to give money to DHE Office so that he/she can get his/her pension. It is strange that after serving for long years, a retired employee has to give bribe to get pension.” Describing about the state of Medical Colleges in Assam, the Chief Minister said, “Even in many of the Medical Colleges, doctors doing post-mortem has to be given bribe by the deceased family. People have to pay money to get even the post-mortem report and this is indeed very surprising.”

“I am not generalising. There may be good people also. I am saying only those instances which I have come across. All these people who have to pay money to get their work done are all common people belonging to middle class. Actually the colleagues should get their retired colleague’s pension done and go to his/her home and hand over the pension papers. But none does this because if the pension papers are sent at home, than the employee probably will not be able to take bribe of Rs.500.” added the Chief Minister.

Taking a dig at the present system, the Chief Minister said, “Very often, people criticise the health department or the concerned minister if any adverse health report is published. Strangely, even the doctors criticise the health department. But what they do not think is that if the doctors took proper care of the patients at hospitals then automatically performance of health department would have excelled. Similarly, the education department is criticised even by the professors for any adverse report on education department or poor performance of students. But if the teachers impart lessons properly or evaluate the answer scripts at proper time then the situation would have been different.”