Bihar govt to reward people fighting corruption

Patna: As the Union Government and Team Anna slug it out over the Lokpal issue, Bihar has taken a cue from Maharashtra in rewarding people who help unearth corruption in the state.

"The government has decided to reward upto Rs 50,000 to those who will help trap public servants while taking bribe or highlight authentic cases of embezzlement of funds," Deputy Chief Minister SK Modi told on Tuesday.

"We have also made provisions for rewarding public prosecutors and investigation officers for successful handling of cases related to confiscation of property of corrupt people," he said.

"The state government has resolved to confiscate the property of corrupt purblic servants to open much needed schools," he said.

The Bihar government's move came even as the RJD urged Anna Hazare to send a team to the state to assess the "deep rooted" corruption.

Hazare should send a team to Bihar to assess prevailing corruption at all levels of government, state RJD chief Ramchandra Purve told reporters while regretting that Hazare gave a certificate of good governance to Chief Minister Nitish Kumar "without knowing the facts".

Purve said he would soon write to the Anna to rush a team headed by either him or Arvind Kejriwal to visit the villages and find out corruption in development and welfare schemes.

The Maharashtra government recently decided to reward those who provide information about corrupt government employees.

The state Home Department in a reply to an RTI query said informers who gave specific information about employees who have amassed wealth beyond their known sources of income will be rewarded. They will be provided protection and their names will be kept secret, it said.

The informers would be paid Rs 10,000 by way of reward for information on corruption involving amounts up to Rs 25 lakh while they would be paid Rs 25,000 for amounts between Rs 25 lakh and Rs 50 lakh.

As per the slabs worked out by the department, Rs 50,000 would be paid for detecting corruption of between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 1 crore, Rs 1 lakh for corruption of between Rs 1 crore and Rs 5 crore and Rs 2 lakh for corruption above Rs 5 crore.