The Hindu : 'Not a moral high ground'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, May 21, 2003

National

National

'Not a moral high ground'

With reference to the opinion piece ``Harsh Treatment'' published in The Hindu of May 10, Binu S Thomas writes from Bangalore:

It was interesting even amusing to read the defence of Harsh Mander. As dear friends of his, the writers, of course, are entitled to do just that. But one would have hoped that those who lay so much stock on the right to information would have some regard for the truth.

They speak of a ``relentless e-mail campaign'' against Mr. Mander. What do they expect when Mr. Mander repeatedly misleads to project himself as a champion of secularism and human rights in order to cover himself with ill-gotten glory? Consider his published statements below:

``My resignation was an emotional one.'' Mr. Mander in The Week, April 21, 2002. ``Yes, I did resign on moral grounds.'' Mr. Mander in The Hindu, August 12, 2002. ``First technically, it is not a resignation from the civil service but a premature retirement.'' Mr. Mander in an interview carried by Drishtipat, a Bangladeshi Human Rights Organisation, in December 2002.

Mr. Mander told the media about having ``resigned'' from the IAS and in the process cynically exploited a national tragedy that was Gujarat to cover himself with glory. Well Mr. Mander was on leave from the IAS on a Rs. 2-lakhs-per-month job with the British NGO ActionAid in India and had on an earlier occasion been recalled by the Government to rejoin the service.

``I have been informed by the Government of India that it has decided to reduce my deputation to ActionAid from four years to one year,'' he wrote to ActionAid India staff in March 2000. But he decided to appeal against the order stating ``It may also be useful for the influencing agenda of AAI for me to lead it while being at the same time a serving IAS officer.''

The lobbying was successful and Mr. Mander was able to keep his IAS post warm but not for too long. He had to choose between service to the country (IAS) and money (ActionAid) and he found in the Gujarat tragedy in 2002 the perfect timing to choose the latter and leave the IAS on a high moral note.The media would have ignored his fake emotional outpouring on Gujarat had he told the truth that he had taken premature retirement from the IAS (in order to keep his highly paid job with ActionAid) and the Rs.10 lakhs or so in early retirement benefits it added to his bank balance.

It was only the ``relentless e-mails'' that forced Mr. Mander to change his story some nine months later as he finally did with the Drishtipat interview. When asked to explain the change in his resignation story, Mr. Mander routinely tells journalists, as he did in Bangalore a few months ago, that ``it is a personal matter.''If safeguarding the democratic right to dissent is the concern of the writers, they also need to recognise the democratic right to publicise the truth.

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