Indira Awas whistle-blower shot dead

By Our Correspondent | www.telegraphindia.com

Ranchi, Dec. 30: An RTI crusader, who exposed misappropriation of Indira Awas Yojana funds two months ago, was shot dead in a Latehar village last evening in a grim rerun of the fatal attack on MGNREGS activist Niyamat Ansari in the same rebel-hit district in March.
Though a hand-written note found beside 40-year-old Pradeep Prasad's body in Salodi, 104km from the state capital, said the PLFI ' a breakaway CPI(Maoist) faction ' was responsible for the killing, police are yet to confirm Naxalite role in the incident.
According to Town police, who exercise jurisdiction over Salodi village, Prasad ' the Latehar block convener of Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, a trade union outfit ' was returning to his native Mukka village on a motorbike around 6pm, when he was intercepted. His bullet-riddled body ' two wounds in the forehead and one in the chest ' was discovered around 8am today.
Latehar SP G. Kranti Kumar expressed his inability to name any individual or organisation behind the attack. "Though the PLFI has claimed responsibility for the murder in Salodi, we are yet to ascertain the genuineness of the note found beside the body. Anybody can write it to mislead the police. We are also trying to verify the motive behind the killing," he said.
Local villagers said Prasad often invoked the RTI Act to highlight corruption in government departments and might have made several enemies in the process.
"In October, he had exposed embezzlement of funds meant for distribution among beneficiaries of Indira Awas Yojana in villages here, which led deputy commissioner Rahul Purwar to suspend a panchayat sevak, Ishidor Aiend," a villager said.
On whether Prasad was the victim of a conspiracy hatched by unscrupulous government functionaries, the SP said: "We are yet to ascertain the exact motive behind the killing and are investigating the case from all angles." He reiterated that the PLFI note could be a decoy to confuse police.
Surprisingly, DGP G.S. Rath said he was not aware of the incident in Latehar, but insisted that the PLFI was not active in that district.
"Latehar is the base of breakaway Maoist groups like the Jharkhand Janmukti Morcha and the Tritiya Prastuti Committee," he added.
After Prasad's body was recovered, angry residents blocked NH-75 near Latehar bus stand for two hours from 9am, demanding adequate compensation for the activist's family. Prasad is survived by his wife and five children ' one son and four daughters.
The protest quelled after the district administration provided Rs 10,000 for last rites and assured Prasad's kin of further financial assistance soon.
On March 2, Niyamat Ansari ' a trusted aide of economist and MGNREGS architect Jean Dr�ze ' was targeted by unscrupulous contractors, backed by Maoists, for exposing rampant corruption in the Centre's flagship rural job scheme in a Latehar village.
While Ansari died after being beaten up brutally by a 12-member gang at Jerua, 130km from the state capital, his friend and colleague Bhukan Singh had a narrow escape because he wasn't home when the rebel-backed group came hunting for him.
Both Ansari ' the block convener of Gram Swaraj Abhiyan and MGNREGS Sahayata Kendra ' and Singh had hit headlines on February 20, when they detected financial irregularities in two projects at Rankikala village in Manika block of the district and lodged an FIR against former BDO Kailash Sahu.
More than Rs 2 lakh were recovered from Sahu and his accomplices during raids that followed.
After much dilly-dallying, the Arjun Munda government sanctioned a CBI probe into Ansari's killing in July. The central agency is yet to begin investigations.

This has been going on and on with no respite from the corrupt government.
The latest example being shown in the Rajya Sabha debate of the Lokpal bill.