Manohar Lal Pal, Harendra Singh & Atish Kumar Singh

Ranchi, Feb. 18: They may be backroom boys, but in no way less influential — or notorious — than their tainted bosses occupying the political centre stage.

Recent raids conducted by the income tax department and lengthy investigations by the vigilance bureau and Enforcement Directorate indicate the pivotal role private secretaries of former and present chief ministers and ministers may have played in what is being dubbed as the great Jharkhand loot.

The list includes Manohar Lal Pal, chief minister Shibu Soren’s private secretary, Manoj Kumar Singh, PA of water resources minister Chandra Prakash Choudhary, Harendra Singh, private secretary of former chief minister Madhu Koda, Atish Kumar Singh, aide of former minister Anosh Ekka, and Uma Shankar Malviya, private secretary to former health minister Bhanu Pratap Sahi.

“It seems, ministers and their private secretaries worked in tandem to loot the state in a planned and organised manner,” said a senior official of a central investigating agency.

Pal is currently the focus of tax sleuths who are unearthing a mining and rural electrification contract scam running up to Rs 2,000 crore during Koda’s tenure as chief minister.

The suspended engineer of CMPDI, a subsidiary of Coal India Limited, may have had no qualms for losing his job, as he managed to curry favour with both Soren and Koda. Pal, a resident of Purulia, Bengal, allegedly forged an engineering degree to get the plum job. The matter is being probed by the CBI.

Talking to The Telegraph, a senior IAS officer, who was posted as deputy commissioner in Singhbhum-Kolhan, recalled his experience. “I once sought help from my boss, then drinking water and sanitation secretary, on an important project, but was advised to present the case in front of Manoj Singh. The matter remained pending for the next two years as a company refused to pay kickbacks to the PA for the contract,” the bureaucrat said, indicating the power these private secretaries wielded.

Manoj Singh, currently lodged in Birsa Munda Central Jail, Ranchi, had surrendered before the vigilance court on February 16. He was remanded in 14 days’ judicial custody. He is being quizzed by the vigilance on fixed deposits worth Rs 13 crore and dozens of government files that were found in his possession during a raid at his ancestral home in Saran, Bihar, on October 16, 2009 .

A case of possession of disproportionate assets was lodged against him after the fixed deposits in the name of relatives, including his father-in-law, were unearthed at Uttar Bharat Kshetriya Gramin Bank in Saran.

“We are also trying to find out how dozens of files relating to various state departments were in his possession even after he ceased to be a minister’s private secretary,” IG (vigilance) M.V. Rao said. A chargesheet against Singh is expected in two weeks.

Harendra Singh, former private secretary of Koda, was originally a junior PWD engineer. He was quizzed by tax, ED and vigilance sleuths after the first round of raids against Koda and his aides.

These private secretaries also have the habit of switching sides to be in power. For example, Rajkumar, former secretary of ex-chief minister Arjun Munda, is now an aide of health minister Baidyanath Ram. “He is very influential,” a health department source said.

Malviya, former PA of Sahi, was earlier with the chairman of Ranchi Regional Development Authority R.N. Tiwary. He was successful in managing a job for his wife. He is now fighting a legal battle to get a job at Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences.

A senior representative of a power company that wishes to set up a plant in the state summed it up best. “PAs are opportunists. They please their bosses with the sole aim of increasing power and pelf. The state and its development is never on the agenda.”