Message from Shri P Shankar, Former Central Vigilance Commissioner

14th  October 2014                                        

It is time again for yet another Vigilance Awareness Week, an initiative of the Central Vigilance Commission that is more than two decades old. The CVC has notified as the theme for the Week, Combating Corruption-Technology as an Enabler. This is a reiteration of the importance the CVC has been attaching to technology to eliminate corruption by increasing transparency and reducing scope for harassment of citizens in accessing services of Government as also in areas of public procurement. I am sure this will provide an opportunity to all public agencies to take stock of the status in their organizations, identify new areas for application of technology and also remove glitches which could be impacting the flow of benefits of the technological initiatives where they are already in use. Needless to say, interaction with the stakeholders is the key to the success of this exercise.

I also note with happiness that the efforts of SIV-G, to inculcate in the youth of the country  awareness of the perils of corruption in public life and to develop in them a strong motivation to confront it, have been gathering momentum over the last decade or so. I wish SIV-G all the very best in this pioneering effort and hope that more and more organizations get involved in this and we could usher in an era where the youth demonstrate  their distaste for corruption in public life  in an effective and unmistakable manner, leaving little choice for one and all but to toe the line. To echo the revered Rabindranath Tagore, let us hope and pray “into that Heaven of freedom, my Father , let my country awake.”