Rs 67L blown on ethics training

The BMC came under fire on Thursday for spending money lavishly on its babus in the name of professional ethics enhancement training, yet producing no visible results. An RTI query has revealed that among the seven BMC officers suspended for dereliction of duty following the collapse of Babu Genu building in Dockyard Road, two were ironically selected for a session on “ethical training” held at Panchgani last year. This professional ethics enhancement training was part of workshops that were mooted by the BMC. Additonally, in reply to the RTI query, BMC joint chief personnel officer P.P. Walinjkar clarified that the BMC had paid a sum of '67.5 lakh to Friends of Moral Re-Armament (India). According to information provided to RTI activist Anil Galgali, executive engineer Atul Kulkarni was amongst those who participated in the programme on October 10, 2012, and is among those suspended in the building collapse case. Mr Kulkarni was part of batch number 5 that had a total of 42 officers in attendance. Incidentally, of the other suspended officers, executive engineer Chandrashekhar Dande and assistant commissioner Chandrash-ekhar Choure were selected for batch number 6, whose session was held between January 7 and January 11, 2013, but only Mr Choure attended the session. “The idea behind the ethics sessions was to get officers to reflect upon their vision, the current reality and gaps in civic administration, but unfortunately the babus did not learn anything or they learnt something otherwise,” said Mr Galgali. Demanding an inquiry on wastage of taxpayers’ money, Mr Galgali, chairman of NGO Athak Seva Sangh added, “The main objective of the administration should have been to give an insight into duties and responsibilities as public servants, to sensitise them and increase productivity, but the BMC has completely failed to do so.” BMC chief Sitaram Kunte could not be reached for comment, as his cellphone remained switched off. Deputy municipal commissioner of general administration department Kiran Achrekar refused to comment on the issue altogether. A senior BMC official, however, said that the idea behind the programme was to tap their own inner resources for inspiration to learn from each other, to evolve a paradigm of ethical leadership and governance for themselves, to discuss case studies and research on the public.