Whistleblowers

Cynthia Cooper was the whistleblower who

exposed massive accounting fraud at
WorldCom in 2002.
A native of Clinton, Mississippi, Cooper worked
as the Vice President of Internal Audit at
WorldCom. After conducting a thorough
investigation in secret, she informed
WorldCom's board that the company had
covered up $3.8 billion in losses through phony
bookkeeping. At the time, this was the largest
incident of accounting fraud in U.S. history.
• Cooper previously worked for the Atlanta offices
of public accounting firms
PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Deloitte &
Touche. She received an undergraduate degree
in accounting from Mississippi State University
and a Masters of Accountancy from the
University of Alabama. She is a Certified Public
Accountant (CPA) in Georgia, Certified
Information Systems Auditor (CISA) and a
Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE).
• Cooper was named as one of three "
People of the Year" by Time magazine in 2002.
• Allen S. Cutler was a Canadian civil servant who
became notable for his role in the sponsorship scandal:
by acting as the whistleblower, Cutler both triggered the
scandal and lost his job. He had been working for the
Ministry of Public Works and Government Services.
• On November 23, 2005, the
Conservative Party of Canada announced Mr. Cutler
would be its candidate in the riding of Ottawa South in
the upcoming federal election. He does not live in the
riding, though. [1] He failed to defeat incumbent MP
David McGuinty.
• Cutler was born in Ottawa, is married and has
two children. He has a degree in Economics
from Carleton University. He is also a director of
the Federal Accountability Initiative for Reform.
• Although his good deed was praised, the Ottawa
Citizen defined Cutler as "one-note-pony".
• Interestingly, Cutler claimed he had never had
any intention of running for Parliament.
However, Cutler did a number of high-profile
interviews before the campaign had begun.
• Shanmughan Manjunath (1978-2005) was an engineer
for the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) who was murdered
for opposing corruption in the erstwhile government
firm's petrol pumps.
• Manjunath was born in Kolar, India, near Bangalore. He
earned his engineering degree from Sri
Jayachamarajendra College Of Engineering, Mysore,
and an MBA from IIM, Lucknow.
• While working for the Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) in
Lucknow, he had ordered two petrol pumps at Lakhimpur
Kheri sealed for selling adulterated fuel for three
months. When the pump started operating again a
month later, Manjunath decided to conduct a surprise
raid around November 19, 2005.
• Having not heard from his son for three days, at
around 9 that night, his father, M Shanmughan,
had sent an SMS: ‘‘How are you?’’.
• There was no reply, because that very evening,
during his inspection, Manjunath had been
abducted, badly beaten up and eventually shot
dead. His body, riddled with at least six bullets,
was found in the backseat of his own car, which
was being driven by two employees of the petrol
pump. Both were arrested and the main
accused, pump-owner Monu Mittal, was held on
November 23 along with four others.
• Following the murder, there was immense media spotlight on the
case. S. Manjunath's batchmates from IIM Lucknow (where he was
affectionately called machan[1]) also kept the story alive. Indian Oil
Corporation paid Rs. 26 lakhs compensation to the family. The
matter of adulteration in diesel was taken up by the Energy
Coordination Committee chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh. One of the policy remedies being considered is to minimize
the subsidy in the price of kerosene (used as cooking fuel by the
weaker classes), and to explore alternate mechanisms for
implementing the subsidy. Subsequently, several tanker trucks,
laden with thousands of liters of kerosene, were seized en route to a
district neighbouring Lakhimpur Kheri [2].
• Investigations into the murder are going on.
• A pan IIM initiative, [The Manjunath Shanmugam Trust]was
registered early February. With immediate objectives of fighting the
case, they have a broader agenda of improving governance in
Indian public life
• One of the policy remedies being considered is to
minimize the subsidy in the price of kerosene (used as
cooking fuel by the weaker classes), and to explore
alternate mechanisms for implementing the subsidy.
Subsequently, several tanker trucks, laden with
thousands of liters of kerosene, were seized en route to
a district neighboring Lakhimpur Kheri [2].
• Investigations into the murder are going on.
• A pan IIM initiative, [The Manjunath Shanmugam Trust]
was registered early February. With immediate
objectives of fighting the case, they have a broader
agenda of improving governance in Indian public life.
• In a handwritten letter to his friend, the hero
of this story had written "My conscience
is my biggest virtue, my wealthiest
treasure and my best guide or
friend. I always do what my
conscience tells or compels me to
do. I want to keep this candle of
humanity ever glowing in my heart.''
The hero's story was a shocking one with a
sob ending.
• He could have continued doing his job as a
deputy general manager in the Centre’s National
Highway Authority of India (NHAI) and shut his
eyes to the variegated ways in which a
prestigious project - Instead Dubey opted to do
the right thing by alerting the PMO to these
developments because he believed the project
was of “unparalleled importance to the nation”.
He paid with his life for having done so”  -
Indian Express