We have seen that the disciplinary authority acts simultaneously as the prosecutor and also the judge, thus wielding double swords i.e. exercising together both administrative and judicial powers. The CEO/CMD is also vested with additional powers to audit, inspect and investigate, whenever, wherever and whatever is to be scrutinised, or probed. The management are thus vested with absolute power to curb misconduct. They are endowed with full-fledged authority to search, to detect, to catch, to try and to punish the wrong-doers with spontaneous promptness and alacrity. Cetacean powers packed and placed at a single set-up, under the hierarchical spread with the CEO or CMD at the top. Despite all these administrative and quasi-judicial capabilities and unbridled authority, are the bank management able to isolate wrong doers and install discipline, cleanliness and purity in the banking services?

But such powers are also vested with every other public authority. Despite all this why our country is rated at 71st place in the corruption index by Transparency International? Why top management is not able to dismantle and destroy the baneful effect of corruption? If the index of convergence of NPA in banks is any indicator, corruption has become widespread. This is meaningfully discussed in Chapter -4 and Chapter -5 on NPA under the Project "Indian Banking Today & Tomorrow".

Yes, corruption exists every where in the world. But can this be a justification for our country being one of the front-runners in that race?

This is because of the tendency of our management to exercise power and authority without accepting equal responsibility. There is no goal-setting, there is no spirit, there is no mission and above all no honesty of purpose. Corruption at the lower level is fought, but incidence of corruption is proportionate to the exercise of power. The senior executives in top management are more vulnerable to the lure and temptations of office and power. It is they, who interact with top-most big customers of the Bank, from trade and industry. Trade & Industry in India are the source and origin for spreading corruption. They choose to bait bureaucrats. They have the means. They evade tax and accumulate unassessed income and unaccounted wealth, the fuel that spreads corruption.

The Banks do have the power, but neither the will, nor the inclination to curb corruption amongst senior executives. A few stray cases occasionally detected and investigated at this level are done by CBI or CVC acting on their independent sources without any reference from the management.

We have seen that conducting departmental Inquiry presupposes utmost good faith, bonafides and objectivity on the part of the management. We have discussed about the canons of quasi-judicial approach and the extension of natural justice to the delinquent officer.

We have also seen that power has to be exercised prudently and wisely in the best interests and realisation of the corporate goals of the management and not arbitrarily or recklessly.

When these standards and safeguards are missing, power instead of being used wisely, is misused grossly and abused. The Public causes turn to be equated with private greed and caprice. What are the attributes or symptoms of management that results in misuse or abuse of power? The answer is not difficult to locate, as we proceed further with the web pages listed under this series.

We have also in the first chapter on "Integrity in Public Life & Service" that corruption in public services is "corporate" and it flows from the top downwards.

In the Banks it is the regional managers and zonal managers, who decide the officers, on whom charge sheets are to be served. The branches are audited periodically and findings in the audit report serve to identify this decision ultimately. No such accountability is enforced on the privileged staff working in the administrative or head offices. They are insulated and deemed corruption-free. In a garland not merely the flowers that smell fragrance, but the thread linking and holding the flowers together as a garland also inherits the aroma or good smell. The staff of the administrative and head office are linked to the company of the privileged bosses, should they not get some consideration as a gift on account of proximity placement?

The distortions in the management of discipline enforcement and non-action on the prevailing widespread corruption are only one part of the situation. We are only making a parting reference to this tragic episode and intend to pass on to a darker side of another inhuman outrage, that of misusing such arbitrary powers on the meeker sections of the officers in the middle management through blatant application malice and victimisation in the guise of taking disciplinary action by the corruption-ridden management. This manifests as deception and fraud in conducting inquiries. How the tool is being used to settle score and to strike on those not dear or near to the bosses, needs no illustration. My own auto-biography My Encounters with Corporate Corruption in my Service will portray a vivid picture of the prevailing atmosphere.

We speak of "good faith" and "bonafides", but we only find "malafide"(bad faith),"malice"(desire to harm) victimisation (personal scores with the unwanted), favouritism & nepotism (gifts to near and dear). This is what we will be discussing in the first web page, i.e. the effect of malice, malafide, victimisation, favouritism and nepotism in conducting inquiries.

Skill, efficiency and perfection never go with corruption and greed. It is the imperfect mind, that breeds greed and acts as fountain source of negative standards. The twin evils always exist simultaneously, i.e. lack of integrity and lack of efficiency. Conducting departmental inquiries presupposes not only honesty of intention, but also possession of skill and knowledge to do justice to the complex task. The second web page titled "Perversities and Deficiencies in the System of Conducting Departmental Inquiries" deals with lack of proficiency, lack of expert knowledge and the incidence thereof in creating deficiency in inquiry standards, like issuing first charge sheet without investigation, and later directing the presenting officer to find suitable evidence and prove the charges.