CVC to use Aadhaar to sniff out corrupt bureaucrats

The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) on Sunday said since Aadhaar was being made mandatory for numerous financial transactions and property deals, it could be used effectively in tracking the ill-gotten wealth of corrupt bureaucrats.

The anti-corruption watchdog was optimistic that information made available through a person's Permanent Account Number (PAN) and Aadhaar cards could help the CVC check if financial deals carried out by the card holder were within his or her means.

"We have prepared a concept paper. The idea is to prepare some kind of an operational procedure and if possible some kind of software so that once it is decided to investigate X, Y or Z, we can connect in a seamless manner with other departments to get the necessary details (regarding the person) using Aadhaar," Central Vigilance Commissioner K V Chowdary told PTI in an interview.

He said data about financial transactions including those related to immovable properties and shares were available in various domain areas of Income Tax authorities, registration departments or Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) and other government agencies.

With Aadhaar being made mandatory for some financial transactions, Chowdary said it would be in a position to get data from a few centralised agencies and use the information for the purpose of determining a transaction made by an individual and to probe disproportionate assets (DA).

The CVC said CBI and other investigating agencies earlier did not have easy access to such data.

"Now that the data is available and it is very valuable, it needs to be leveraged. This data ... will give a much better picture of receipt, expenditure and investments of an officer," said Chowdary, who headed the income tax department before taking over as the chief of the probity watchdog.

Expressing the resolve to take every possible step and route to weed out corruption in line with Prime Minister Narender Modi's vision for a "corruption-free nation" and war against black money, he said the human aspect - such as role of individuals and auditors - in the Punjab National Bank (PNB) loan scam showed that investigation needs to look at the use of technology for misdeeds and for covering them up.

This, Chowdary said, would require some software preparation, Standard Operating Procedures and perhaps some approvals. "It is under preparation," he said.

PTI