Sam Pitroda Resigns As Adviser To Pm

High profile telecom guru Sam Pitroda has resigned as adviser to the Prime Minister on Technology Missions prompting the government to abolish the post altogether, official sources said.

A note from the cabinet secretariat said Pitroda was being relieved with immediate effect. The order, formalised on June 12, was apparently in response to a letter to Prime Minister I K Gujral from Pitroda expressing his wish to resign.

The order abolishing the post with the status of a minister of state too was made after cabinet secretary T S R Subramaniam met Gujral to discuss the matter, the sources said.

 

Pitroda, who was visiting Jakarta when the order was issued, is reported to have said that he had recently written to the Prime Minister that he wanted to be relieved.

He said his current preoccupation as chairman of WorldTel, a London-based telecom venture capital fund, as well as with technology-related work had been taking most of his time.

I like to believe that I have done whatever I could and for whatever it is worth for the Technology Missions. Now it is no longer justified for me to retain the position as adviser to the Prime Minister, he said.

The five technology missions on literacy, water, immunisation, telecommunications and oil seeds were created during former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's tenure.

Their mandate was to fundamentally alter management and delivery systems in these five areas, which Sam Pitroda identified as crucial in nation building. At the time of their conception the missions were the most ambitious concerted campaign in the country's history to revolutionise development strategies.

The missions' success have been described as average, with some however, particularly telecommunications, literacy and immunisation, making an extraordinary impact.

Pitroda said he had been contemplating resigning since the assassination of Gandhi in 1991. I had expressed my wish to leave several times during Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao's government but I was persuaded to stay on he said.

This despite my having said that I was not able to devote the kind of time that I could earlier, he added.

There was a strong feeling among those handling the missions that during Rao's tenure they had lost the drive and enthusiasm that characterised their functioning under Gandhi.

With Pitroda gradually cutting down his involvement in the mission work they were reduced to being typical government departments going through the motions. In the past one year .

Sam Pitroda was unable to devote any substantial time to the missions and had all but given up.

It was in keeping with the missionary zeal that Pitroda eschewed taking any salary other than a token one rupee a year over the last 10 years. But he was given a government house and a well-attended office in Sanchar Bhavan, the country's telecom headquarters.

Lately there had been rumblings in the media about Sam itroda continuing to enjoy government perks even while hardly finding any time for the mission work. I put in 20 hours a day for several years for the mission work. It is only in the last few months that I was not able to devote the kind of time they demanded. What perks is the media talking about? I paid for everything, he said.