Health ministry probing if IIPS juggled NFHS data under tenure of director KS James: Official source

New Delhi: Juggling NFHS data, research papers being leaked to foreign entities and lapses in recruitment are among the alleged irregularities that took place during K S James' tenure as IIPS director and these are being probed by the health ministry, reported news agency PTI quoting official sources.

The International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS) comes under the health ministry and designs the four-yearly National Family Health Survey (NFHS), for which it also collects and collates data.

James was suspended by the ministry on July 27 till the completion of inquiry.

It is alleged that the suspension comes in the wake of the institute publishing the latest survey, NFHS-5, which contained data that contradicts the political agenda of the government, such as continuing open defecation and lack of access to green fuel in rural India. Online media The Wire has claimed that James was asked by the government to resign earlier as it was not happy with certain data sets that came up in the surveys conducted by the IIPS.

On July 29, the ministry in a note had said complaints were received regarding irregularities in recruitment and appointments, and compliance with the reservation roster. To investigate these, a fact-finding committee (FFC) was constituted by the Union health ministry on May 6.

"The FFC found prima facie irregularities in 11 of 35 complaints received. These irregularities were mainly regarding lapses observed in certain appointments, recruitment of faculty, reservation rosters, and dead stock registers among others," the ministry had said.

The charges are serious in nature and the director of the IIPS, being the head of the institute, is directly or indirectly responsible for the failure to exercise adequate supervision, it had said.

The FFC had also recommended an inquiry against the registrars for the corresponding period as well as the director concerned.

On Thursday, an official source told PTI, "The complaints which have been received against James include irregularities in data collection and processing for NFHS which are a matter of major concern and are being looked into by the ministry."

Besides these, there are also allegations of research papers being leaked to foreign entities, irregularities in recruitment and construction of new buildings, and violation of the reservation roster and dead stock registers, which are being probed, the sources said.

"Apparently, it has been alleged that he also attended a China-based webinar. All these are allegations being investigated," the official source said.

The ministry had also said his suspension "was felt necessary to prevent avoidable interference in free, fair and fast investigation to gather sufficient documentary evidence and corroborating facts and circumstantial evidence to frame a firm charge-sheet to institute a fair disciplinary proceeding against the Director, PS and other officers if required".

CPM central committee member and former minister with Kerala government Dr TM Thomas Isaac slammed the suspension. “In my previous post, I highlighted the troubling actions taken by the union government in manipulating the 2021 Census, unemployment survey, consumer survey, and poverty figures. The suspension of Prof James has further exacerbated the severity of these attempts to undermine data accuracy and transparency, pushing these measures beyond acceptable limits,” he wrote on Facebook.

With PTI inputs