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Thiruvananthapuram , Dec. 25

THE former Forests Secretary, Mr Bharat Bhushan, has expressed anguish over the `bad patch' hit by the State Government in negotiating its way through a maze of court cases involving upkeep and retention of precious forest wealth.

Mr Bhushan was speaking to newspersons here after he was granted permission by the State Government to clarify his position in a run-in with the Additional Advocate General (AAG), Mr V.K. Beeran, over the conduct of a sensational case.

According to Mr Bhushan, he was well within his rights to insist on seeing the affidavit prepared on his behalf by the Advocate General's (AG) office in the Palakkad strong room robbery case, which Mr Beeran had sought to criticise and had gone to town with, by holding a press conference in Kochi the other day. It was this that had forced him to reply to the latter's charges in a public forum, for which he had sought special permission, which was granted.

The whole issue must be seen in the context of the controversy over the existence of alleged nexus between the forest mafia and Government advocates and officials in the State, Mr Bhushan said. "The entire system needs a thorough revamp, and the cleansing drive must cover not just the institutional mechanism for conducting forest cases, but also the system followed in posting of officials. Sensitive areas should be placed under officers with proven integrity."

There have been High Court verdicts giving graphic accounts of how this vicious circle operated leading to wholesale decimation of forests, Mr Bhushan said.

Referring back to the contentious affidavit, he said the draft was sent to him, upon which he had suggested certain changes pertaining to some unsubstantiated charges against a forest officer.

A charge mounted against him by Mr Beeran was that the changes suggested were meant to save the accused.

"Which accused is Mr Beeran referring to? The strong room robbery case was investigated by three agencies: the State police, the Crime Branch of the State police, and now, the CBI. As far as I know, none of these agencies had named any person as the accused in this case. The only outcome of this is the suspension of 12 officials on charges of dereliction of duty."

While naming a forest official thus suspended whom he suspected Mr Beeran might have been alluding to, Mr Bhushan lamented the fact that whistle-blowers had "a way of inviting all sorts of calamity on themselves in the system that we have inherited."

The fate of Mr V.K. Francis, who helped foil organised land-grabbing bids in the Mathikettan ranges only to be served with suspension orders for more than a year, is too recent to deserve a mention, Mr Bhushan said.

In a similar manner, the official suspended in the strong room case had to brave frequent transfer orders served on him, and had got back to Palakkad after fighting a case against the latest in the series of such transfers in the court.

"I have reasons to suspect that the stand taken in the strong room theft case by certain responsible people was not entirely meant to protect the interests of the Government," Mr Bhushan added.

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