Not approached yet, but ready to be CIC: Kiran Bedi

PATIALA - Former top cop and Ramon Magsaysay award winner Kiran Bedi, whose name has been proposed by civil society members for the job of Chief Information Commissioner (CIC), said she is ready to accept any position where she can work for upliftment of society.

“I have no problem in accepting any post of a governor or of CIC but I want to make one thing very clear that I am not a political person. I do not know how to do politics; I just want to serve my country and its people,” Bedi told reporters here Monday, in answer to a question.

“So far, nobody has approached me (for CIC) and I have only read about these in newspapers. However, if I get an offer of CIC, then I would work for only one rupee. I do not need position or money, and all my salary would go to NGOs,” said Bedi, India’s first Indian Police Service officer.

Bollywood actor Aamir Khan and social activist Anna Hazare are among several people who have urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to appoint Bedi as the head of the country’s top transparency body, the Central Information Commission.

The post has been vacant since senior bureaucrat Wajahat Habibullah resigned last month to take up his new assignment as Right to Information watchdog in Jammu and Kashmir.

She added, “The condition of health and education sectors is ‘erratic’ in our country. Our government needs to make more investments in these two very important areas. We should also question the government on why they are not using public money to raise the standards.”

Bedi was the chief guest Monday at the annual convocation of Thapar University here, around 65 km from state capital Chandigarh.

“I retired in 2007 and since then I have been very busy in various things that have connected me with the common person. I am doing TV shows, writing columns, working for my NGOs Navjyoti and India Vision Foundation, travelling to places for the screening of my documentary film ‘Yes Madam Sir’,” said Bedi.

Award-winning film “Yes Madam Sir”, based on Kiran Bedi’s life, has been produced by Australian filmmaker Megan Doneman.

Bedi was the first woman to join the Indian Police Service (IPS) in 1972.

“I am running two NGOs for the last 21 years which reach out to over 10,000 beneficiaries daily, in the areas of schooling and proper upbringing of children of prisoners and in drug abuse treatment,” she pointed out.

Minister of State for External Affairs Preneet Kaur was honoured with a degree of Doctor of Science (honoris causa) at the convocation. Kaur is the MP from here and the wife of former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh.