To put degree of corruption into perspective, I want to talk about Late Dan Rostenkowski. He was a US Congressman from Illinois for close to thirty years and became the chairman of House Ways and Means committee (one who deals with disbursement of funds). He was as established a politician as they come. He was Mr. Washington. He got convicted of corruption. The two of the major charges were a mail order fraud for $50,000, using his influence to help his friends and (what really boggled my mind was) misuse of government vehicles. Think about it! Misuse of government vehicles! If that were imposed in India, every class 1 officer would be in jail. ALL OF THEM! As far as the amount of money is concerned, he could not hold a candle for our politicians. A man like A Raja plays in billions and not thousands. There is corruption in the US but is neither condoned nor does it go unpunished. On the other hand, one trillion dollars of Indian money in Swiss banks says it all about corruption in India.Democracy is a system which needs time to take roots. Even after it takes roots, people have to have faith in the system. I am talking about non-religious faith, the kind that keeps the wheel and every cog in it moving slowly but surely. If a population does not have that kind of faith, then democracy will never work. Case in point is Muslims countries where non-religious faith is considered blasphemous.
Faith, by and large, means believing is something. What can Indian population believe in? The government and the bureaucratic machinery are rotten to the core. From the peon to the PM, no one is untouched by corruption. In case of a problem, the aam aadmi thinks many times before approaching the police or the bureaucracy or the judiciary for help. The election commissioner who is supposed to execute his duty in a non-partisan fashion is the lap dog of one political party. Someone raises doubts about the electronic voting machines and gets arrested. Then whom should the voter turn to? Did you say Supreme Court? That's what I would have said until I read allegations by former Union Law Minister Shanti Bhushan. He claims that eight out of 16 judges were corrupt. This is like the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. I would like to use the “fox in charge of the hen house” but this is too sanguine a matter to be using frivolous metaphors. Supreme Court judge UC Banerjee was in charge of enquiring into Godhra station massacre. He ruled that the fire was accidental despite all the proofs. He was working at the behest of the champion secularist Laloo Yadav. CJ Rangnath Mishra whose name is on the list was the head of a commission on minority status. What kind of fairness can the majority Hindus expect from this man? Rajkot Police Commissioner Geeta Johri questioned the judicial propriety of Justice Tarun Chatterjee, who headed a Bench, ordering a CBI probe against Gujarat Minister Amit Shah when he himself was under CBI probe in the Ghaziabad Provident Fund scam. These judges are the final adjudicators of our society. If they are not going to do the right thing, who does the aam aadmi turn to? Is there really hope for Democracy in and people of India?
Here are two articles:
8 of the 16 SC Chief Justices of India were Corrupt Says Ex Law Minister
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