TV series details stories behind disciplinary violation cases

BEIJING, Dec 18 -- A new TV series, which features interviews with informants, punished officials and representatives from China's top disciplinary watchdog, has revealed stories behind the campaign to improve officials' working practice.

The four-episode program, jointly produced by the publicity department of the Communist Party of China's (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) and state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV), was first aired on Monday.

The production team visited 18 Chinese provincial-level regions and covered more than 30 cases, according to the CCDI website on Monday.

In one case, a CPC grassroots organization in Wuxi City in east China's Jiangsu Province was found to have used public funds to pay for a meeting for 83 officials in 2012. The meeting involved a jaunt to China's southeast coastal resort of Xiamen .

"I spoke to our village's Party chief and said: 'Didn't you see the TV show about the CPC's eight measures to fight extravagance and waste? The money used to cover the travel of those 80-plus officials was from taxpayers' pockets," Zhou Jiankang told the film crew.

Zhou had reported the violation to the local disciplinary authority in Wuxi.

Investigators later found that the officials had only conducted a half-day meeting and the remainder of the four-day tour was spent sight-seeing, according to the TV series.