It would be wrong to assume that most of India's 1.2 billion people are corrupt; it is only a dominant minority of about one million people who may be corrupt. The chief reason for this is the lack of leadership and morality among the political masters. This again has happened over the last few decades with the most talented, the educated and the honest in India not taking to a political career. Consequently, there has been usurpation of politics by a set of unscrupulous opportunists of dubious character and education, with a no-holds barred ambition for power and self-aggrandisement at the cost of the nation.
The recent phenomenon of Anna Hazare capturing the imagination of the people, especially of the young, is symptomatic of the simmering anger of the common man against corruption. Civil society in India has always needed a rallying point to fight authority. This phenomenon has been observed since the pre-independence days. Now that civil society has gained some symbolic, yet significant, space in the crusade against corruption, the momentum should not be lost.
One of the fountainheads of corruption is election where large amounts of money are needed for the battle. Despite an effective Election Commission, it is an open secret that money still plays an ugly role in garnering votes. No amount of anti-corruption measures will be effective unless this murky aspect of Indian political life is eliminated.
One of the ways to do it is to introduce full state funding of elections with the Lokpal and the Election Commission exercising a strict supervision of election expenditure and audit of accounts of the political parties. Once the stranglehold of money power is broken, talented people with good education and moral standing can enter politics.
The Jan Lokpal Bill piloted by civil society has a lot of merit in curbing the menace of corruption. There could be arguments that it may violate some provisions of the Constitution of India. Be that as it may, if the Constitution needs to be amended, so be it.
The rule of law is the bedrock of democracy. In India, the criminal law justice delivery system has failed on account of a politically-oriented police force and ill-equipped prosecution by the state. This failing of the rule of law has resulted in increasing criminalisation of politics. The only remedy is to reform the police force and to increasingly allow talented and committed private prosecutors to come into play.
Another Anna Hazare kind of movement is required to introduce police reforms. Once such reforms are in place, criminalisation of politics and the attendant corruption can be contained.
One of the other murky aspects of Indian politics is to offer all kinds of freebies to people during election time. This needs to be prohibited at all costs. This is nothing but bribing the electorate at the cost of the public exchequer.
For long, the political class in this country has had a vested interest in the illiteracy and backwardness of the vast multitudes of the population. The country will continue to be a caricature of democracy where money, power and criminality are alone required to win elections in utter disregard of the aspirations of the millions. To this end, the law giving the right to education should be speedily and meaningfully implemented so that the blight of illiteracy and backwardness is banished from the face of India.
Once civil society thus becomes a meaningful partner in democracy, India will be unstoppable and nepotism and corruption will be a thing of the past. Let us pray and hope that thus the second tryst with destiny will happen soon.
(The writer is a corporate lawyer with L V V Iyer & Associates, Hyderabad.
His email is iyerassociates@sify.com)
