WHAT IS THE ROOT CAUSE OF CORRUPTION INDIA ? NICELY EXPLAINED BY RAJAN SINGH THRU QUORA DIGEST

One common question I faced when I was serving in the IPS was, “Why is there so much corruption in government/police?”

Let me start by asking you a question. Imagine you are building a power plant or constructing a high-rise building (say in Mumbai). You have put in all the applications to get the government approval, but you don’t bribe anyone or put any pressure, and just follow the process.

How long will it take to get all the approvals?

One month? One year? 5 years?

Call me a cynic, but I think there is a good chance it won’t happen in your lifetime. You will need approval of 20–25 departments, and you may not even have heard of some of them.

The bureaucracy’s real power is the power to obstruct. This brute power to wreak havoc in lives of citizens is the one of the root causes of corruption in India.

Let us dig deeper.

1. Our red tape ridden government machinery has evolved from the Licence Permit Raj, a monstrous life sucking machine, even if well intentioned. Here is how it works.
1. If you need anything done, you need approval from every department on the planet, even if the relevance maybe in one in a million cases. Revenue, fire-force, police, pollution control, environment… the list goes on. Everyone has to say yes. And they can take as much time as they want.
2. Since there are so many laws and rules, a babu can block things for hundred different reasons. Nobody is fully sure about things.
3. See below a report in Wall Street Journal, where we are top of the charts in red tape.

1. Here is an example: Now, say you need approval from 20 government departments. In each department, say 5 people go through your file. While none of them can say yes, each can put an obstacle. So you are facing 100 guys who can stop your dream project.
1. Unless each of those 100 guys is sensible and honest, your approval is in trouble. And trust me, you will be in trouble.
2. I will give you an example. In 2005 I was SP Security and I came across a file in which a resort owner had asked for permission of use of wireless walkie-talkie for coordination among staff in a resort near Kerala-Tamil Nadu border. Our Special Branch head-constable reported that there may be LTTE sympathisers in that area who could snatch the walkie-talkie sets and use it for illegal purposes. By this logic, no technology can be used by anyone since everything can be misused. This file was stuck for years because of this.
2. In short, everybody can block you. So nothing moves, unless you pay up. As they say, “Nothing is allowed, but everything is possible.”
3. Another important point is that not everybody is corrupt. In Kerala, most IAS and IPS officers are honest. Even lower down, there is a mix of honest and corrupt guys. But even an honest officer will not be able to stop others from corrupt activities, when so much negative power is vested in them. We have a deadwood of a system.
4. Why are our corruption scandals typically 100–1000 times largerthan than those in rich countries like US, France, or Israel?
1. What is the scandal involving Israeli PM and his wife? $100,000 (Rs 75 lacs). And that is for ordering free food! You will get beaten up if you offer such minuscule bribe to even a low level political functionary in India.
2. Such massive corruption is not possible without blessings and support of the political class at the top.
5. Why is the political class so corrupt? Is it just bad people? No, there are deeper reasons.
1. Political parties need money to operate. And that money has to come from somewhere.
2. Let us say a party organizes a dharna or rally for which 10,000 people have to be brought. You will have to spend on marketing (loudspeaker announcements, house visits), food, transportation, and in some cases liquor. Assuming Rs 500 per person, the cost of a 10,000 person rally is Rs 50 lacs. I suspect it is even higher.
3. Each party is running an army of workers and a massive machinery, which has to be well-oiled.
4. Election campaigns: Crores are needed to fight each parliamentary seat. We have not even talked about the horsetrading and things like that.
5. Where does that money come from? Donations cover it to an extent. But it is often not nearly enough. Rest comes from contracts, government appointments, purchases, roads and infra, government schemes, licenses and approvals, you name it...
6. What about political party workers?
1. How much salary do they get? Maybe a few thousand rupees. Do they live on bread and water? No.
2. While some are ideologically motivated, many become corrupt over time. Why would they come to your rallies and stand in hot sun, throw stones, and get beaten up by police? How do you compensate them?
3. Senior guys get perks like Chairmanship of PSUs or other positions, where they can make money. Other guys just use their influence and act as middlemen for everything. From contracts, transfers, recruitments, and peddling favours, they make money.
4. In essence, if you are an honest politician, your followers will be poor and unhappy. I have seen honest politicians struggle to stay relevant.
7. Indian government spends a lot. Too much money to be siphoned off. Too many schemes, too many projects. Look at fodder scam. I am not even getting into all the ‘spending for the poor’.
8. Before we blame the politicians and wash off our hands, just wait. What about rest of us?
1. Do we attach any social stigma to corruption? Let us say, if a guy is accused of double murder, he may find it difficult to get a bride for his son. But if he has piled up hundred crores through corruption, there is absolutely no such problem. He will have a queue of people lined up.
2. Even though we rail against corruption, we elect corrupt politicians. We want our neighbour to be honest and all laws applied to him. With ourselves, we are much more lenient.
3. The reality is, ‘corrupt is the new smart’. The corrupt guy is the ‘practical guy’.
9. Enforcement is poor because investigation and prosecution is also done by the people who come from the same society.
1. It is like trying to wash dirt on your white shirt with muddy water. Good luck with that!
2. Also, the prosecution process and evidence required is very complicated. Even God would not be able to get most cases convicted.

We don’t have universal healthcare or education, but we do have universal corruption. Decentralized, and democratized.

The way we all complain against corruption, it looks like it is perpetrated by aliens. It is as if our politicians were imposed on us by the British. Really?

We have built this country. We own it. And we are responsible for all the good and evil around us. If not through complicity, through our silence. The shame is ours. The blame is ours. This mess we are gifting to our children, is ours.

No amount of waving of national flag, no amount of donation to temples and churches, no amount of blaming politicians will wash this stain.

There has been way too much slogan shouting in public. What matters is what we do in our private lives.

Are we going to do something about it?

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Rajan Singh

Founder and CEO, ConceptOwl