How Modi behaved 'adversely' towards Gujarat PSU turnaround man: Autobiographical account

Despite triggering a major turnaround of the top state public sector undertaking, Gujarat State Fertilizers and Chemicals (GSFC), during his stint as GSFC managing-director during 2003-06, ex-IAS bureaucrat Alexander K Luke was given “adverse remarks” in his Annual Confidential Report (ACR), which was written by his minister, Saurabh Patel (energy and petrochemicals), and approved by chief minister Narendra Modi for two years, 2004-05 and 2005-06, when he was with GSFC.Revealing this in his latest book, “Passports of Gujarat: Hazardous Journeys”, Luke says that the reason for the two adverse CSRs he was given was “lack of respect for the elected representatives of the people and refusal to follow government instructions.”
Giving a glimpse of the turnaround to which he was instrumental, Luke says, the GSFC’s three years’ loss up to 2003 was Rs 680 crore. After he joined in, in 2003-04 the PSU made a profit of Rs 42 crore, followed by Rs 252 crore in 2004-05, and Rs 437 crore in 2005-2006.
The share price of GSFC was Rs 14 in April 2003, which went up to Rs 251 in May 2006 (14 times), as against the peers like Tata Chemicals, whose share price increased from Rs 68 to Rs 275 (four times), Coromandel from Rs 62 to Rs 114 (two times), and of RCF, a Central Government PSU, from Rs 22 to Rs 72, (three times).
Interestingly, in June 2006, during Modi’s visit to the GSFC to inaugurate a new plant, Luke suggests, things had already become abundantly clear” The chief minister described the turnaround he had triggered as “a third model”, without once mentioning him, “except light-heartedly” asking him to “pay back to the state government the financial help given to the PSU.”
Luke comments, listening to Modi, “one would have concluded the turnaround was an act of God or the result of the lavish financial help, close monitoring and guidance from the state government”.
Worse, during the function, the chief minister did not like Luke being presenting an identical memento which was given to Modi by the GSFC union leader for the turnaround. Even before the union leader could hand it over to him, he saw the chief minister angrily get up and leave the stage.
“It was curious behaviour from a leader who has himself been the recipient of such adulation from the public, adulation which he has done nothing to restrain. This was sometime in June 2006, four months before my departure”, comments Luke.
The adverse ACRs, which triggered Luke’s resignation from the IAS in November 2006, two years ahead of his retirement, came, suspects the author, because of several incidents of “petty in nature”.
While its beginning could be traced to Luke’s letter to his IAS colleagues during the 2002 riots to condemn the “bloodbath”, Luke says, the immediate reasons were his disagreement to certain “suggestions” of the chief minister.
Thus, Modi wanted the GSFC to give Rs 10 crore to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund and the transfer of an officer who was related to the minister for urban development – both of which Luke rejected.
Giving an account of his resignation, Luke says, he was hurriedly asked to leave GSFC on November 10, even though he was scheduled to hand charge on November 11, with clear indications that if did not do so then disciplinary action would be taken against him.
Pointing to how farcical things bcame, Luke says, on reaching the state capital, Gandhinagar, he was asked to meet the chief minister on November 13.
“When I met him, he said had not expected me to actually be leaving and was surprised at it. He said I ought to stay in Gujarat for the next 5 to 7 years”, Luke says.
Modi even went to the extent of asking him “not to give him an answer right then but to think it over for three days after which we could meet again”.
Yet, Modi signed the resignation file “the same evening, perhaps soon after I left his room.”
And, November 20, early morning, Luke and his wife “drove to the airport and an hour later saw Vadodara receding below.”

Comments

Ahmedabad's civic chaos: Drainage woes, waterlogging, and the illusion of Olympic dreams

In response to my blog on overflowing gutter lines at several spots in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur, a heavily populated area, a close acquaintance informed me that it's not just the middle-class housing societies that are affected by the nuisance. Preeti Das, who lives in a posh locality in what is fashionably called the SoBo area, tells me, "Things are worse in our society, Applewood."

RP Gupta a scapegoat to help Govt of India manage fallout of Adani case in US court?

RP Gupta, a retired 1987-batch IAS officer from the Gujarat cadre, has found himself at the center of a growing controversy. During my tenure as the Times of India correspondent in Gandhinagar (1997–2012), I often interacted with him. He struck me as a straightforward officer, though I never quite understood why he was never appointed to what are supposed to be top-tier departments like industries, energy and petrochemicals, finance, or revenue.

PharmEasy: The only online medical store which revises prices upwards after confirming the order

For senior citizens — especially those without a family support system — ordering medicines online can be a great relief. Shruti and I have been doing this for the last couple of years, and with considerable success. We upload a prescription, receive a verification call from a doctor, and within two or three days, the medicines are delivered to our doorstep.

Powering pollution, heating homes: Why are Delhi residents opposing incineration-based waste management

While going through the 50-odd-page report Burning Waste, Warming Cities? Waste-to-Energy (WTE) Incineration and Urban Heat in Delhi , authored by Chythenyen Devika Kulasekaran of the well-known advocacy group Centre for Financial Accountability, I came across a reference to Sukhdev Vihar — a place where I lived for almost a decade before moving to Moscow in 1986 as the foreign correspondent of the daily Patriot and weekly Link .

Environmental report raises alarm: Sabarmati one of four rivers with nonylphenol contamination

A new report by Toxics Link , an Indian environmental research and advocacy organisation based in New Delhi, in collaboration with the Environmental Defense Fund , a global non-profit headquartered in New York, has raised the alarm that Sabarmati is one of five rivers across India found to contain unacceptable levels of nonylphenol (NP), a chemical linked to "exposure to carcinogenic outcomes, including prostate cancer in men and breast cancer in women."

Revisiting Gijubhai: Pioneer of child-centric education and the caste debate

It was Krishna Kumar, the well-known educationist, who I believe first introduced me to the name — Gijubhai Badheka (1885–1939). Hailing from Bhavnagar, known as the cultural capital of the Saurashtra region of Gujarat, Gijubhai, Kumar told me during my student days, made significant contributions to the field of pedagogy — something that hasn't received much attention from India's education mandarins. At that time, Kumar was my tutorial teacher at Kirorimal College, Delhi University.

Tracking a lost link: Soviet-era legacy of Gujarati translator Atul Sawani

The other day, I received a message from a well-known activist, Raju Dipti, who runs an NGO called Jeevan Teerth in Koba village, near Gujarat’s capital, Gandhinagar. He was seeking the contact information of Atul Sawani, a translator of Russian books—mainly political and economic—into Gujarati for Progress Publishers during the Soviet era. He wanted to collect and hand over scanned soft copies, or if possible, hard copies, of Soviet books translated into Gujarati to Arvind Gupta, who currently lives in Pune and is undertaking the herculean task of collecting and making public soft copies of Soviet books that are no longer available in the market, both in English and Indian languages.

Dalit rights and political tensions: Why is Mevani at odds with Congress leadership?

While I have known Jignesh Mevani, one of the dozen-odd Congress MLAs from Gujarat, ever since my Gandhinagar days—when he was a young activist aligned with well-known human rights lawyer Mukul Sinha’s organisation, Jan Sangharsh Manch—he became famous following the July 2016 Una Dalit atrocity, in which seven members of a family were brutally assaulted by self-proclaimed cow vigilantes while skinning a dead cow, a traditional occupation among Dalits.

Boeing 787 under scrutiny again after Ahmedabad crash: Whistleblower warnings resurface

A heart-wrenching tragedy has taken place in Ahmedabad. As widely reported, a Boeing 787 Dreamliner plane crashed shortly after taking off from the city’s airport, currently operated by India’s top tycoon, Gautam Adani. The aircraft was carrying 230 passengers and 12 crew members. As expected, the crash has led to an outpouring of grief across the country. At the same time, there have been demands for the resignation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, and Civil Aviation Minister Venkaiah Naidu. The most striking comment came from BJP MP Subramanian Swamy, who stated : "When a train derailed in the 1950s, Lal Bahadur Shastri resigned. On the same morality, I demand PM Modi, HM Amit Shah, and Civil Aviation Minister Naidu resign so that a free and fair inquiry can be held. All that Modi and his associates have been doing so far is gallivanting, which must stop." Amidst widespread mourning, some fringe elements sought to communalize the tragedy. One post ...

Search This Blog