Tainted DDA gets a new chief again

With the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) scam the latest to rock Delhi as Assembly elections approach, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee...

With the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) scam the latest to rock Delhi as Assembly elections approach, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has stepped in to clean up the mess.

As a first step, Anil Baijal has been named the new DDA vice-chairman — the second in a week — with a mandate to clean the organisation. An additional secretary in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Baijal trades places with Suman Swaroop who had moved into the DDA headquarters at Vikas Sadan only on Tuesday.

Before exiting for the BJP national executive meeting in Indore on Thursday evening, Vajpayee had an hour-long discussion with Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vijay Kapoor and Cabinet Secretary Kamal Pande. The agenda was short and crisp: who should be given the task to clean the DDA. There was apparently a view that the task was beyond Swarup though she has an impeccable reputation.

Vajpayee’s hurt over charges of corruption have shown in recent days. At the NDA rally on March 29, he hit back at Sonia Gandhi for calling the ruling coalition ‘‘a government of scams’’: ‘‘Rajniti satta ka khel ban gaya hai aur satta ghar bharne ka rasta (politics has become a power game and power a means to fill your coffers)…nobody should talk about scandals in my government…our public life is transparent.’’

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To show that it means business, the government decided to clean the DDA after phone intercepts revealed that the sacked vice-chairman Subhash Sharma (now under arrest), absconding middleman Dharamveer Khattar and others made 200 deals in four days. Aware of Sharma’s political connections, the PMO, which had received complaints, gave the green signal to the CBI to raid senior DDA officials.

If it was to send signals ahead of the Assembly polls, Delhi BJP president Madan Lal Khurana was no help. By defending Sharma before the visual media, he made it a little awkward for the party.

It’s understood that at the PMO meeting on Thursday, Vajpayee and Advani went through the list of IAS officers in the grade of additional secretary before deciding on Baijal. Advani drove home the point there was an immediate need to rid DDA of corruption.

The urgency of the matter can be gauged from the fact that the file was sent to Indore today for Vajpayee’s signature.

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A 1969 batch IAS officer, Baijal has served as chief executive officer of Prasar Bharati, Indian Airlines chairman-cum-managing director, chief secretary of Andamans and Nicobar and Delhi home secretary. He takes charge of DDA next Monday.