OPERATION DURYODHANA

 

A COBRAPOST-AAJ TAK investigation unearths 11 MPs accepting cash to table questions in the Indian Parliament.

 

By ANIRUDDHA BAHAL

 

If used rightly, tiny, lens bearing aperatures, can empower a citizenry by exposing democracy’s toxic acreage. Operation Duryodhana, a COBRAPOST-AAJ TAK investigation lasting nearly eight months succeeded in capturing the acts of 10 Lok Sabha and one Rajya Sabha members as they accepted money from representatives of a fictitious body called the North Indian Small Manufacturers’ Assosciation (NISMA) for asking questions in the Indian Parliament. In all more than 60 questions were submitted by 11 MPs of which 25 questions (at last count) were tabled in the Parliament.

 

The MPs who took money for putting questions in the Indian Parliament are:

 

Narendra Kushwaha (BSP) - Rs 55,000

Anna Saheb M.K. Patil (BJP) - Rs 45,000

Dr Chhatrapal Singh Lodha (BJP) - Rs 15,000

Y.G. Mahajan (BJP) - Rs 35,000

Manoj Kumar (RJD) - Rs 110,000

Suresh Chandel (BJP) - Rs 30,000

Raja Ram Pal (BSP) - Rs 35,000

Lal Chandra Kol (BJP) - Rs 35,000

Pradeep Gandhi (BJP) - Rs 55,000

Chandra Pratap Singh (BJP) - Rs 35,000

Ramsevak Singh (Congress) - Rs 50,000

 

The MPs submitted questions on NISMA’s behalf and some of them were selected—and their answers given—in the Parliament’s rigorous balloting system that reduces chances of questions being taken up to something akin to a raffle. Some of the questions were rewritten by the middlemen taking us to the MPs concerned before being put in Parliament, some came nearly verbatim and only certain sections of some were picked up by the Parliament staff. The COBRAPOST team also has in its possession many, original signed forms of MPs, blank as well as filled up, which weren’t submitted but set aside as evidence.

 

From the start it was my assessment that in order for a reportorial team to remain undercover for a long duration it would be prudent to have a woman reporter as the primary asset on the field. Their biggest advantage in undercover situations is that even in an extreme atmosphere of suspicion they have greater chances to evade a search for hidden camera equipment then men and for all the right reasons. Besides Suhasini Raj, the reporter, who was inserted in the field with an alias of “Namita Gokhale”, had a past selling insurance and was a fast talker. Never at a loss for words, she ended up doing an extraordinary job on the field, surviving several anxious moments when many middlemen and even MPs got their antennae up. The fictitious front under whose umbrella the COBRAPOST team operated was NISMA, ostensibly an organization out of Moradabad in Uttar Pradesh, that lobbied and worked for the interests and welfare of Small Scale Industries (SSIs). That was, in a nutshell, our story. Even though on several occasions I was tempted to enter the field much earlier than I actually did, I held back realizing that it wouldn’t be prudent for there was a chance of somebody recognizing me. When I did eventually take the field with an alias of “Navratan Malhotra”, executive director of the ‘fictitious’ NISMA, I was armed with a ludicrous wig and even more ludicrous glasses.

 

The field atmosphere in May, when the initial contact was made with all the middlemen and MPs, was loaded, for the AAJ TAK episode concerning Tihar jail had just happened. And the infamous casting couch episode of India TV was still fresh in everybody’s minds and unlike the advantage that existed more than four years back while Tehelka was undercover with Operation Westend, people were now hugely aware of the existence of hidden cameras and initial meetings were rather awkward with middlemen taking precautions. All this resulted in a slow development of the story.

 

There were seven principal middlemen, namely, Harish Badola, Chandrabhan Gupta, M.K. Tripathi (alias Chotiwala), Mohan, Dinesh Chandra, Ravinder Kumar, Vijay, and some others. While Harish was our conduit to three BJP MPs (Anna Saheb M.K. Patil, Y.G. Mahajan and Chhatrapal Singh Lodha), Gupta introduced us to three MPs (Lal Chandra Kol and Narendra Khushwaha of the BSP and Chandra Pratap Singh of the BJP), Mohan Mani lead us to one (BJP MP Pradeep Gandhi), Vijay took us to two MPs (Ramsevak Singh of the Congress and Suresh Chandel of the BJP), and Ravinder Kumar (BSP’s Raja Ram Pal) and Chotiwala (RJD’s Manoj Kumar) to one MP each. Dinesh was the middleman who sent us across to four other middlemen—Gupta, Vijay, Ravinder and Mohan. And it was Gupta who introduced us to Chotiwala and Harish. A dangerous rivalry broke out between Gupta and Dinesh in May when Dinesh came to know that Gupta was undercutting and double crossing him by introducing us to MPs without his knowledge putting the whole operation in peril. But more of that later.

 

After the first round of encounters finished by the last week of May, the COBRAPOST  team went into a period of hibernation till the session of Parliament began in late July. One, because the team didn’t have any quality video equipment. Two, we wanted to see how many of the MPs actually put in the questions we gave them and how many of those submitted questions actually made it beyond the balloting process of the Parliament to eventually get selected. Three, things were heating up in North Avenue, where most of our middlemen and parliamentarians were situated, and the team wanted to retire from the scene for a few weeks to let things cool down.

 

To take you first through the case studies of the seven MPs (Kushwaha, Patil, Lodha, Mahajan, Manoj Kumar, Chandel and Lal Chandra) whose questions made it through the balloting process to get tabled in the Parliament and thereafter the remaining four (Ram Pal, Gandhi, C.P. Singh and Ramsevak), who took money but whose questions were filtered out of the question selection process.

 

Narendra Kushwaha

 

On May 9 the COBRAPOST met Narendra Kushwaha of the BSP. Arguably, the most colourful of all the MPs he has earned a reputation for his unpredictability and eccentricity that makes even middlemen wary of him. Gupta meets the reporter outside Khushwaha’s residence and tutors her on how to go about striking a deal with Khushwaha. Says Gupta: “Question de dena aur keh dena aapka sahyog chahte hain (Give him the question and say that we want your cooperation).” Gupta also tells us to give Rs 25,000 to Kushwaha and warns us that every MP we deal with through him has to be given the same amount or it could lead to complications later on. The reason he gave is that the MPs cross check the pay-offs with each other.

 

Khushwaha meets the reporter in the drawing room but leads her to his bedroom. When the reporter feels uncomfortable and suggests they shift back to the sitting room the MP acquiesces but asks her to come and sit close to him: “...hiyan baitho (sit next to me).” The question given to Khushwaha in this first meeting, for submitting in the Lok Sabha, is about the working of so-called five star hospitals and their rather exorbitant fee structure. Khushwaha is given Rs 25,000 in this meeting in a yellow envelope, which is kept in the table in front of him. Says Kushwaha, “Theek hai (Okay).” Many weeks later, Khushwaha blames the non-selection of the hospital question on it being too long: Says he: “…Wo type karke laya…bahut lamba tha (He had got it typed…It was too long).”

 

He also expresses displeasure at a particular MP getting more money for the same work and at one stage asks for the names of other MPs the NISMA is dealing with in regard to its petition. He also offers to get more MPs on board free of cost, saying lecherously, “Aapke paas deh hai na (You have your body to offer).”

 

In October, the MP calls to demand Rs 5 lakh for asking questions in the winter session. In Khushwaha’s words: “Paise dogi humko? Pura paanch lakh rupya. Hum utha den question is baar? (Will you give me money? A total of Rs 5 lakh. Tell me should I take up your questions this time around?).”

 

On November 6, Khushwaha also meets Malhotra and asks for Rs 5 lakh for putting in questions the whole year on NISMA’s behalf. Reiterates Khushwaha to the COBRAPOST team: “To is saal mein to aapko…maine kaha na ki paanch lakh dila do (For this year I have already told you get me Rs 5 lakh).” That day Khushwaha is paid Rs 30,000 in all. Rs 20,000 during the meeting with NISMA’s director and Rs 10,000 a few hours later. The balance of Rs 470,000 is agreed to be paid to him by cheque after TDS (tax deduction at source) even though Khushwaha prefers cash. Kushwaha wants the cheque in the name of his personal secretary Ajay Kumar Singh and has him furnish all details about his bank account number, etc. Kushwaha also takes Malhotra for talks to his bedroom and has him watch a CD of his speeches in the Lok Sabha. He accepts two more questions to be tabled in the winter session.

 

When accepting the sum of Rs 10,000, later, he gets upset for the amount is too small. Says he: “Arre yaar itna kam (So little, my friend).” He also asks for the cheque to be delivered soon. In his words: “Suniye cheque bahut jaldi banaiyega (Listen, make the cheque at the earliest).”

 

In the meeting with the NISMA’s director, Kushwaha is a goldmine of information. He tells us that commission for MPs in the MPLAD (Member of Parliament Local Area Development) scheme is around 10 per cent (each MP gets a sum of Rs 2 crore every year to spend in his constituency any which way he deems fit). Says Kushwaha, referring to the MPLAD scheme: “Kitna khate hain, khata hoga… dus per cent khate hain … bees hi lakh rupya na hua. Usme aapko sansadhan, gadi kitne rakhne hote hain MP ko (How much do they embezzle? Hardly 10 per cent. That comes to only Rs 20 lakh. So what? After all, an MP has to maintain all the paraphernalia, a retinue of cars, etc that go with his lifestyle).”

 

Kushwaha also tells us that middleman Gupta took a cut of Rs 5,000 even from the sum of Rs 25,000 paid to the MP in the first meeting and how Gupta also sold the free air tickets issued to his employer, BSP MP Lal Chandra, on the black market.

 

Of course, throughout his interactions and conversations with the reporter he never loses an opportunity to make passes at her. Sample some phrases: “Arre tum to meri poori awaaz hi lekar chali gayi ho (You have taken away my voice)”, “Rukenge hamare yahaan (Will you stay at my place?)” and more.

 

Anna Saheb M.K. Patil

 

On May 11, COBRAPOST team met Patil through middleman Harish, a stenographer in the Parliament. Harish has strong connections with politicians, many of them relying on him for filing questions in the Parliament and other related work. Harish charges NISMA an introduction fee of Rs 5,000 for every MP that he takes us to. Later, he also charges us for drafting questions in the parliamentary format, translation, liaison with different MPs for getting them sign on question forms and submitting them in the Lok Sabha.

 

Patil, the BJP MP from Maharashtra, was minister of state for rural development in the NDA government. In his words he is a technocrat. An alumnus of IIT Kanpur (“Ist ranked”), he claims to be a sworn critic of political corruption. While initially Patil was given a tsunami related question, he soon takes to NISMA and ends up pocketing a total of Rs 45,000 for submitting questions on its behalf. One of the questions on whether certain items reserved for the small scale sector have been dereserved recently ends up appearing in the starred category (where the law-maker gets to ask the question orally to the minister concerned) and falls on July 26, the first day of the monsoon session. But, unfortunately, because of the clash between Gurgaon police and the agitating workers of Hero Honda the Lok Sabha that day could not conduct its business. Patil even arranges a pass for “Namita Gokhale” to attend the particular Lok Sabha session besides asking her for more “research” notes on the topic to be able to make an impression in the House.

 

In the second meeting, Patil confirms the receipt of Rs 25,000 sent to him through Harish. He’s also paid another Rs 10,000 as reward for the appearance of one of the questions in the starred category. When asked whether the reward was right, Patil says: “It is not sufficient but somehow I am satisfied.” On the reporter asking him whether another sum of Rs 25,000 would be fine, he says: “Ya, ya, that would be fine.”

 

NISMA also hands over Patil a draft of the petition to be moved in Parliament. Eventually, Patil draws up a grand scheme on how to get the petition going and how he would lobby for NISMA’s interests. He promises to muster up support from a cross section of politicians and also spells out a strategy to influence various parliamentary committees. For all this help he spells out a budget of Rs 10 lakh. Patil doesn’t want to talk to his colleagues for a mere “Rs 25,000” for they would “laugh” at him. In Patil’s words: “At about…not less than 10 lakhs.”

 

On October 11, Patil accepts another Rs 10,000 from the reporter for raising questions in the winter session of the Lok Sabha. He accepts the money in a comic manner—asking the reporter to deposit the money “under the seat”. It’s also the first time that he agrees to accept payment from NISMA by cheque. Says Patil: “See, suppose I can give you the name of my relatives…and you draw the cheque.”

 

Later, in a meeting with NISMA’s Malhotra at a suite in Maurya Sheraton, Patil insists early on that “nowadays the work, either in Parliament or assemblies, ...cannot be done without a lobby”. With reference to big corporate goons, Patil says that it’s a “tragedy not that is…they are ruling the country.” The MP from Erandol talks about how the corporates can not only influence policy but “they can make any…any law or any sort of a legislation”. He has a memorable take on legislators: “…What is their party for them? Nothing. …Nothing. Money is the party.”

 

And, a few sentences later: “Nalayak hain saale sab. Corrupt hain sab (They are all good for nothing. They are all corrupt).”

 

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