Raja's read only memories

Bellary, synonymous with illegal mining, rampant corruption and ex-minister Gali Janardhana Reddy, is in the limelight, for the right reasons, for a change: it is all set to get its representative to the Vidhana Soudha, the seat of power of the Karnataka Assembly, after it went to the hustings recently. If C and HTML programming and even mundane tasks like cooking can have a dummy’s guide or a dictionary, then the chequered past of the iron-rich district of Karnataka, too, can have one. So, here goes: A – stands for AP Mines and Mineral Development Corporation (APMMDC), whose director V D Rajagopal (not to be confused with this author!) was arrested in connection with illegal sanction of mining leases to the behemoth that is Obulapuram Mining Company, owned by jailed former minister G Janardhana Reddy; also stands for Anantpur district in AP where OMC was also said to have obtained the permits for mining; also stands for ‘able independent’ which JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswam...

These are testing times indeed for the office of the ombudsman, the Lokayukta, in Karnataka. Only recently, Justice Shivaraj V Patil was forced to step down as Lokayukta after a fine piece of journalism , by the Bangalore Mirror, revealed that he had obtained a plot of land in his wife’s name, which he had ought not to as a judicial officer. Another piece of investigative journalism, this time by the New Indian Express, reveals that former Lokayukta Justice N Venkatachala had converted a residential site allotted to him in Judicial Layout in Bangalore , into a tennis court, in full violation of land norms – a minor violation of course, compared to some scandals doing the rounds in the nation’s judiciary. It must be remembered that Venkatachala was N Santosh Hegde’s predecessor – the man behind the investigative report on illegal mining that felled a chief minister and jailed a powerful minister. In fact, many wondered whether Hegde would be able to emulate him, such was the aura...