No takers to assess govt's fight against corruption

In an apparent setback to its transparency initiatives, Centre has dropped for the second time a plan to review its fight against corruption under a mandatory obligation of a UN convention following poor response to its global tender.
The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) had in last May floated a request for proposal to conduct a self evaluation study by independent experts on India's compliance with United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC).
However, in October it was decided to "close" the offer for want of a minimum of three qualifying applicants.
The DoPT had again in January this year decided to conduct the study to assess the existing measures to check corruption.

"The tender process initiated with the Request for Proposal (RFP) through advertisement dated January 23, 2013... has been cancelled after acceptance of the recommendations of the Consultant Evaluation cum Monitoring Committee (CEMC) on the proposals received in response to the advertisement," according to an official order issued by the DoPT in this regard.
Sources said the evaluation committee cancelled the RFP process as it could not get the desired response from the interested parties.

UNCAC, which acts as a universal legal instrument to deal with the menace of corruption globally, was ratified by India on May 9, 2011.
The convention requires states parties to provide in their domestic legal system, measures, legal and administrative, for prevention of corruption; for making certain acts relating to corruption as criminal offence and providing for sanctions against them and for facilitating recovery of assets in trans-border corruption.

Besides, it calls for promoting widest possible international cooperation in combating trans-border corruption through measures facilitating, mutual legal assistance, extradition and joint investigations.
India has been slotted to be reviewed in the ongoing fiscal -- 2013-14-- by the governmental experts of two other member countries of UNCAC under the review mechanism.
"We will decide the plan of action for the conduct of study shortly," a DoPT official said.
India is among 164 nations which have either ratified or acceded to the UNCAC provisions.