Discount Deals: MEA’s smart move to get discounted Mercs for its diplomats

WITH the festive season round the corner, companies have begun to shower discounts across India. For Indian middle class shoppers, getting a good deal during the season is a priority. But, ever heard of ministry of external affairs (MEA) striking a smart bargain deal with a German auto company to get world class cars at discounted rates for Indian diplomats? Here it is:
German auto company Daimler Chrysler, the maker of Mercedes-Benz, was giving 15% discounts for cars being used in Indian missions and posts abroad. But in 2010-11, a new arrangement was finalised under which discounts were increased to 25%.
Here is what ministry of external affairs’ annual report for 2010-2011 says: “Arrangements were finalized with M/s Daimler Chrysler AG, Germany, to avail of diplomatic discount, which increased from 15% to 25%, for the vehicles purchased by Indian Missions/Posts abroad. With India’s growing interaction with several countries, additional vehicles were sanctioned for a few missions to meet enhanced transportation requirements”.
The discounts remained at 25% for the next year too. Here are excerpts from 2011-12 annual report of MEA. “Keeping in view several requests received from Indian Missions/Posts abroad, for pre-mature replacement of furniture and equipment, the prescribed life-span of these items was reviewed. For purchase of vehicles abroad, arrangements were finalised with Daimler Chrysler of Germany to get 25 per cent diplomatic discount on purchases by Indian Missions/Posts. Some additional options were given for payment of emoluments to employees working in hard currency countries to ease hardships caused by currency fluctuations.”
There is no readily available record to figure out how many Mercs were actually bought at a discounted rates.

List of 1993 batch IAS empanelled as joint secretaries
The following 62 IAS officers of 1993 batch have been empanelled as Joint Secretaries or equivalent at the Centre: Ravi Kota (Assam cadre), Kailash Chand Samaria (Assam), Anil Kumar Singhal (AP), MT Krishna Babu (AP), Gopal Krishna Dwivedi (AP), B Kishore (AP), C Parthasarthi (AP), YV Anuradha (AP), K Damayanthi (AP), Sandeep Poundrik (Bihar), Uday Singh Kumawat (Bihar), Mihir Kumar Singh (Bihar), Amit Agrawal (Chandigarh), Kamlesh Kumar Pant (HP), Deepti Umashankar (Haryana), Sukriti Likhi (Haryana), V Umashankar (Haryana), Neerja (Haryana), Dheeraj Gupta (Jammu and Kashmir), Asgar Hassan Samoon (Jammu and Kashmir), Usha Titus (Kerala), K Ravindran Jyothilal (Kerala), Tushar Gin Nath (Karnataka), Sanjeev Kumar (Maharashtra), Manisha Verma (Maharashtra), Lokesh Chandra (Maharashtra), Abha Shukla (Maharashtra), SS Zende (Maharashtra), Mahesh R Zagade (Maharashtra), Sanjay Dubey (MP), Dipti Gaur (MP), Manohar Agnani (MP), Neeraj Mandloi (MP), SB Singh (MP), RK Srivastava (MP), Prashant Kumar Singh (Manipur-Tripura), Vivek Kumar Dewangan (Manipur-Tripura), Nagaraju Maddirala (Manipur-Tripura), Amardeep Singh Bhatia (Nagaland), Deoranjan Kumar Singh (Orissa), Nikunja Bihari Dhal (Orissa), AK KalOaram Meena (Orissa), Surendra Kumar (Orissa), Rakesh Kumar Verma (Punjab), Ramesh Kumar Ganta (Punjab), Tanmay Kumar (Rajasthan), Shikhar Agarwal (Rajasthan), Akhil Arora (Rajasthan), Gagandeep Singh Bedi (Tamil Nadu), Sunil Paliwal (Tamil Nadu),  S Vijay Kumar (Tamil Nadu), Rajiv Aggarwal (Uttar Pradesh), Alok Kumar-II (Uttar Pradesh), Veena Kumari Meena (Uttar Pradesh), Chandra Bhanu (Uttar Pradesh), Prashant Goyal (Uttakhand), Vikram Dev Dutt (Uttar Pradesh), Khilli Ram Meena (Uttakhand), Punya Salila Srivastava (Uttakhand), Roshni Sen (West Bengal), Prabhat Kumar Mishra (West Bengal) and Dushyant Nariala (West Bengal).