The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

by confuzzled dude Sat Feb 21, 2015 8:43 pm

But anyone with even a passing knowledge of the way government offices function, would know that such leaks cannot take place just at a junior level. In all likelihood, certain senior officials both in the government and even in the companies, are involved. Therefore, the probe must not stop with the punishment of junior officials.

However, there are limits to what the police can achieve. It is the government that needs to tell the public how it plans to bring to justice the ‘big fish’ behind the scandal. There is no way it can prevent such leakages purely by assigning lower level accountability.

Besides the obvious criminality of the scandal, the leaks also represent a very serious governance failure, for which Mr Narendra Modi’s government is squarely to blame. Never before has the sovereign functioning of the Government of India been so severely compromised to corporate interests as it has under this government. What could be more symbolic of this failure than the fact that certain corporate executives and the dubious consultants hired by them have been made privy to parts of the finance minister’s Budget speech weeks before it is presented before Parliament?

The pilferage of secret documents from the Union government’s offi-ces is only an extreme manifestation of the cronyism that this government is plagued by. Mr Modi’s favourite industrialists find a prominent place in his business delegations and on international high tables. The State Bank of India gave a Rs 6,200 crore loan to one of these industrial houses for a project that no international bank wanted to touch with a barge pole.

Those behind the corporate espionage have been emboldened precisely by this culture of cronyism fostered by the BJP. But this culture of cronyism, particularly in the petroleum sector, is not restricted to Mr Modi’s government. During the previous NDA regime, a senior functionary of one India’s biggest private petroleum company was given an important political assignment in the petroleum ministry, then headed by Mr Ram Naik.

Contrast this to the manner in which the UPA promoted transparency and accountability by bringing in the Right to Information Act. More specifically, in the petroleum ministry, the UPA government, in 2010, set up an Audits and Ethics Committee in the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation. After such a massive scandal, it is imperative that the government launches a crackdown.

Knowing the way Mr Modi’s government functions, it is likely that it will use this incident to clamp down on transparency, while continuing in its unabashed promotion of cronyism. What is needed is a comprehensive policy framework to assign accountability and prevent such scandals from happening.
http://www.deccanchronicle.com/150222/commentary-op-ed/article/dc-debate-biggest-corporate-espionage-scandal-ever-seen

by Marathadi-Saamiyaar Sat Feb 21, 2015 8:54 pm

confuzzled dude wrote:Contrast this to the manner in which the UPA promoted transparency and accountability by bringing in the Right to Information Act. More specifically, in the petroleum ministry, the UPA government, in 2010, set up an Audits and Ethics Committee in the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation. After such a massive scandal, it is imperative that the government launches a crackdown.

http://www.deccanchronicle.com/150222/commentary-op-ed/article/dc-debate-biggest-corporate-espionage-scandal-ever-seen

Joke of the decade.....2G scam, Vadra Scam, Bellary brothersscam, Maran scam.....need more ?

lol!

by truthbetold Sat Feb 21, 2015 9:21 pm

CD posted paragraphs that talk non sense like his anti modi posts. Even the stupidest critics of modi would know this problem existed for ever. Reliance was the biggest culprit with direct access to nehru-gandhi family and MMS.

However BJP itself is no stranger to crony capitalism.

It is possible that this scandal is a result of honest police work. But it is also possible that it could be a political gimmick of modi govt to show they are against corruption after delhi election loss. Another possibility is that it could be a result of BJP internal rivalries.

by confuzzled dude Sat Feb 21, 2015 9:26 pm

It is a sham. It is merely an exaggerated drama playing out on TV screens whose real purpose is political posturing and image-makeover, and not to arrest criminals. The arrest of five people, including two from the petroleum ministry, and interrogation of a dozen more in the Great Document Leak are about hype and partial lies, based on CCTV footage.

The timing of the police action and the media circus that followed raise eyebrows. Is the government serious about cleaning up its act to ensure secrecy of its decisions? Are there other factors that worked in this case, in which, as is being claimed, documents from the petroleum ministry were routinely and clandestinely photocopied by a gang of four people, and sold to corporate houses and consultancy firms?

Going by the evidence, the latter may be true. This is not to deny that the theatrics are not rooted in any facts. No one denies that the petroleum ministry had gaping holes through which documents were leaked to businessmen, middlemen, lobbyists, consultants and, of course, the media.

After this case, the bureaucrats will be cagey to dole out documents to their favourites in the oil and gas sector, including lobbyists and consultants. Other ministries will get the message that they could be arrested if they indulged in similar practices.

In a single swoop, Modi hopes to plug information holes in his government. He wants to cut off the information flow from the various ministries to either state-owned, Indian private or foreign firms. This is the beginning of a new era of transparency, in which information and decision-making is centralised, and external middlemen and lobbyists are marginalised. In such a scenario, all roads will lead to 7, Race Course Road, and business houses will be forced to line outside Modi’s office.

http://scroll.in/article/708239/The-petroleum-ministry-document-leak:-hype,-lies-and-CCTV-footage

by Sponsored content

The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

Re: The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

Re: The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

Re: The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen

Re: The biggest corporate espionage scandal ever seen