Logged out for months, names of errant bureaucrats will soon be back on cvc.nic.in, the official website of the Central Vigilance Commission. It will be in line with Chief Vigilance Commissioner P. Shankar’s decision to publicise names of only those officials against whom vigilance inquiries have been completed and recommendation for major penalties accepted by the Government.Of the 97 names cleared to face major penalties, 24 are from Railways and 16 from the SBI. Others in the infamous list belong to the Union Bank, Bank of India, DDA, Department of Personnel and IGNOU.The lone IAS officer whose name will come up on the website is a former Collector of Sangli in Maharashtra. Shankar told The Indian Express that the decision to withhold names of officers whose vigilance inquiries were pending was in keeping with the 1964 guidelines put out by the Ministry of Home Affairs.‘‘After an initial lull, movement of cases has started picking speed. I expect a higher success rate with more and more recommendations for penalties accepted.’’ According to Shankar, of the 200-odd cases pending with the Government for sanction of prosecution, 66 were cleared between November and December last. ‘‘I’ve been sending reminders to secretaries of the departments involved. I think this is an excellent response,’’ he said.During former CVC N. Vittal’s tenure, the practice was to put out names of all officers facing inquiry. Until August-end, the website carried 2,427 names with only 52 cases being cleared for prosecution in an entire year. This raised the hackles of a section of the bureaucracy, the reason why Shankar decided to follow the Home Ministry guideline which states that names, designations and departments of only cases which end in major punishment be publicised.
