CVC's e-initiative gets over 5,000 graft complaints

New Delhi, May 29, 2012 : Over 5,000 complaints of
corruption in various government departments have been
received through Central Vigilance Commission's e-initiative
'vigilance eye'.
  People have registered complaints through project Vigeye,
a special website launched to encourage people to report
corruption by uploading videos, audios or raising complaints
online through it, CVC officials said.
     The project was launched by former Central Vigilance
Commissioner P J Thomas in December 2010.
     Speaking at a recent conference, Vigilance Commissioner R
Srikumar had given examples of how common citizens brought
corruption cases to the notice of CVC using Vigeye and how
action was taken against whom the charges were proved.
     "In our fight against corruption, participation from
every stakeholder namely, employees, officers, customers,
citizens etc. was important. Empowering citizens to
participate in vigilance was necessary.
     "There are 255 districts in the country where rule of law
does not work and extremism had taken deep root. The rule of
law should be upheld. Project 'Vigeye' is an example of
participative vigilance. The application, which can be
downloaded, enables any person to act against corruption,
instead of simply grumbling about it," he has said.
     Srikumar said that more than 5,000 complaints had been
received under Vigeye. "There was a need to take this system
to the next level by putting in place necessary infrastructure
like a call centre to handle the large number of complaints,"
he added.
According to officials, Vigeye provides a more
user-friendly platform for interface between the CVC and the
citizens who may have suffered at the hands of corrupt
officials and who want to disclose information about such
illegal activities.
     Srikumar also favoured the importance of unions in the
offices. He said that people take unions as
anti-establishment.
     "However, unions were necessary, since they pointed out
what was going wrong in the organisation, People on the street
were asking for more probity in public life. CVC with about
300 staff alone cannot fight corruption. Participation of
every stakeholder was needed," the Vigilance Commissioner had
said.
     According to the information on the CVC's vigeye portal,
there were about 7,448 registered users.
     "The Vigeye is getting good response. We will enhance
capabilities of organisations involved in dealing with it," a
CVC official said.