DD team unearths Rs 64 crore ‘in-house’ scam in Srinagar

Masoodi & Co approved 14,000 programme episodes without budget in 2 years, created Rs 52 cr liability for DDK Srinagar

“The responsibility squarely lies on the part of the authorities who approved the programmes and the Producers of Doordarshan who utilized the services / logistic support of the outside service providers without having funds in hand and that too without the concurrence of competent authority. Those authorities at DDK Srinagar, who conceived the idea of programme production headlessly and aimlessly without having adequate fund in hand and the required time slots for airing the programmes, are the ones who should be blamed for and brought to justice”

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Sep 30: What Early Times has been reporting about Doordarshan Kendra (DDK) Srinagar and DD Kashir since 2009, has been confirmed now by DD’s own two-member inquiry. The team headed by Deputy Director Administration (DDA) of Directorate General of Doordarshan has unearthed “in-house approval scam” to the tune of Rs 64 crore in DDK Srinagar. It has discovered that two successive Heads of Programme (HoP) and incharge Directors of DDK Srinagar have run the approval bazaar while practicing worst kind of nepotism and favouritism and approved over 14,000 programme episodes in just two years---against the ceiling of 4,000 episodes---and thus created sizable liability of Rs 52 crore over and above the sanctioned budget in 2009-10 and 2010-11.

The team from Directorate General, comprising DDA Ashok Kumar and SO Nadeem Ahmad, scrutinized DDK Srinagar records and questioned officials from September 5^th to September 13^th. It has sent a 20-page report on its findings to DD’s DG, Tripurari Sharan, through ADG North, Ashok Jailkhani. According to highly placed sources in Prasar Bharti Broadcasting Corporation of India (PB), DD Directorate General has now slapped a show-cause notice on 19 officers of DD, asking them all to explain their position in the matter of approving as many as 15, 969 programme episodes without sanction and availability of budget in 2008-09, 2009-10 and 2010-11.

The report, a copy of which is available with Early Times, holds these officials guilty and recommends action against them all. Those receiving the show-cause notice include Dr Rafeeq Masoodi, who functioned as Director DDK Srinagar and HoP from 2008 to 2011 and DDP Mrs Shami Shair, who functioned as Director and HoP, from July 2011 to September 2012. Both have been removed from DDK Srinagar. While as Dr Masoodi, now holding the rank of DDG, has been placed under suspension earlier this year, Mrs Shair has been recently shifted to DD headquarters in New Delhi but not given any posting.

“The responsibility squarely lies on the part of the authorities who approved the programmes and the Producers of Doordarshan who utilized the services / logistic support of the outside service providers without having funds in hand and that too without the concurrence of competent authority. Those authorities at DDK Srinagar, who conceived the idea of programme production headlessly and aimlessly without having adequate fund in hand and the required time slots for airing the programmes, are the ones who should be blamed for and brought to justice”, says the report.

The report illustrates how the Directors/ HoP have approved hundreds of proposals containing thousands of ‘in-house’ programme episodes from their “hand-picked Resource Persons” through Programme Executives (PEXs) and non-programme officials like cameramen and floor managers on their own volition and sweet will in flagrant violation of DD codes and procedures as also without sanction or availability of budget under PPPS. It has pointed out that fixation of number of episodes of different proposals, mostly drama serials and musical packages, budget of such programmes of identical nature as well as scheduling the dates of telecast and making payments to the unauthorized contractors (Resource Persons) has depended merely on sweet will of PEX and Director DDK Srinagar.

Out of two programme serials of identical nature, over 100 programmes have been approved in favour of one outside contractor and just 6 in favour of another resource person. Budget too varies from programme to programme without any scientific evaluation, says the report.

It has observed that while practicing the worst kind of nepotism and favouritism, DDK Srinagar Directors have approved/allotted innumerable programmes in favour of their under-hand contacts, acquaintances, relatives and family members through a group of PEXs and other officials. The beneficiary “Resource Persons”, locally known as Thekedars, have not signed any contract with PEXs or HOPs but invested or planned to invest their own money on these productions. As per the uniform modus operandi, they have all given names of their own family members or friends as “facility providers” to DD and drawn/ prepared to draw cheques of payment in these very names.

“After getting ‘going ahead signal’ for production of a particular programme from the Director, the PEX could have applied their mind to tie up the physical as well as financial resources available at the Kendra before starting the work of production.  But they invariably hire somebody from outside on verbal basis to arrange various facilities and logistics to be utilized for programme production and that person work as the main Resource Person during the entire production period for providing required services / logistics (as reported by the PEX during the enquiry). The resource persons make all monetary investments during the period of programme production. The resource person also acts as a link person between the PEX of Doordarshan Kendra and the actual facility/logistics providers”, says the report.

“It is observed that the PEX at the Kendra who have been assigned the work of Programme Production enter into a tacit understanding with the Resource Persons (hand-picked by them) without any authority with undeclared commitment that their investment would be paid back in due course by the Department”, the report adds.

“After the programme production is over, the final product in the shape of a tape is stated to be previewed by the concerned PEX who after satisfying himself the workable condition and the quality of the product, deposits the same with the Tape Library in Doordarshan Kendra. The concerned PEX does not make any presentation before any committee or before the Director / HOP. The concerned PEX do not also make any mention or give certificate whatsoever in the concerned file or proposal register”, it further adds.

“Depending upon the availability of the funds, the Account Section makes payments in the name of the Resource Persons. It is noticed by the team that on most of the occasions the cheques issued in favour of the Resource Persons are first received by the some of the officials of the Kendra and then stated to be delivered to the persons concerned”, observes the report.

The report further adds: “It is seen that pick and choose method was adopted in taking a decision which programme would be telecast when. Lack of uniformity in approach is glaringly visible, as some programmes were telecast after the gap of two year or more whereas some of the programmes were got telecast on within a week after its completion or even on the same day”.

The team has pointed out that DDK Srinagar’s availability of time slot was just three hours a day and accordingly maximum of six programmes of 30 minutes duration could be produced/ approved for a day. In other words, maximum of 2,000 programme episodes could be made/approved for one year. As against this, 1870 programme episodes have been approved/produced in 2008-09 and total liability of Rs 7.21 Cr created.

However, in the 2009-10, when Rafeeq Masoodi was Director/ HoP, DDK Srinagar approved/ produced as many as 4,410 programme episodes---nearly 2,400 over and above the ceiling of 2,000 programmes. On account of this further liability of Rs 17.00 Crore was created.

Third year of Rafeeq Masoodi’s posting as Director and Head of Programmes at DDK Srinagar witnessed the worst. As many as 9,689 programme episodes of shadow Thekedars were approved/ produced in so-called ‘in-house category’. This recorded an all-time high excess of 7,689 programme episodes. It created further liability of Rs 37.35 Crore. Even after DG of DD imposed blanket freeze of this approval bazaar, liability of Rs 3.26 Crore was raised in 2011-12 when Shami Shair functioned as incharge Director and HOP.

According to the calculations of the DD team, DDK Srinagar has approved/ claimed to have produced as many as 14,099 programme episodes in just two years i.e. 2009-10 (4,410 episodes) and 2010-11 (9,689 episodes), creating excess of 10,089 episodes and liability of Rs 54.35 Crore.  With the liability of Rs 7.21 Crore in 2008-09 and Rs 3.26 Crore in 2011-12, the team has calculated the cumulative liability of DDK Srinagar at Rs 64.81 Crore.

S. No	Year	Limit as per time slot	Number of programme episodes approved/ produced	Programme episodes produced over the limit	Amount of liability created
1	2008-09	2,000	1,870	Within limit	Rs 7.21 Crore
2	2009-10	2,000	4,410	2,400	Rs 17.00 Crore
3	2010-11	2,000	9,689	7,689	Rs 37.35 Crore
				Liability of 2011-12	Rs 3.26 Crore
				Total liability	Rs 64.81 Crore

Year-wise break-up of the liability of Doordarshan Kendra Srinagar as created by Rafeeq Masoodi, Shami Shair and their subordinate officials.