Consensual Corruption

Since then, however, we have veered to the opposite extreme, and profit has cometo justify everything, including outright fraud, corruption and criminality.Just as we practiced an utterly false socialism, we have now committed ourselvesto a substantially false capitalism and liberalism. The most significantbeneficiaries of the new 'licentious raj', as in the old 'licence raj', arepolitical and bureaucratic middle men, commission agents and money changers whomanipulate the system to skim the cream off the top of every deal, buildingpersonal fortunes of thousands of crores in tenures that last no more than a fewyears.

That is the reason why Parliament has been reduced to a forum for debates on onescandal after another, with little time left over for discussion of policy, andwhy political parties are utterly devoid of any credible design for India'sfuture beyond platitudes about globalisation, rapid growth and India's presumedfuture as a great power.

Commission agents and money changers have penetrated every aspect of thenation's functioning, including, crucially, national security. Purchases ofequipment for the defence, paramilitary and police forces are now in the domainof these money changers, whose utterly unscrupulous pursuit of profit endangersnot only the lives of India's fighting men, but the security and integrity ofthe nation itself. As has repeatedly been the case through history, India isplundered through these opportunistic instrumentalities, whose avarice and abuseexpose the nation to grave risk.

It is, however, not sufficient to rail against corruption. If the malaise is tobe addressed, the degree to which it has become integrally linked, indeed,completely enmeshed, with the acquisition and retention of power within theIndian system must be understood fully. That is why, despite the fitful andhalf-hearted action that is sometimes taken against the occasional high-profileoffender who is unfortunate or foolish enough to get caught, a culture ofimpunity generally prevails.

Political parties are quick to 'forgive' and rehabilitate those who are known tocontrol the purse-strings of large and ill-gotten fortunes, and little stigmaattaches to the subjects of scandal once the media spotlight has shifted. In anyevent, with little to choose between various political formations in the countryon this count, corruption has tended to become electorally irrelevant. Andwithin a democratic system, if an issue cannot lead to the loss of power, itwill generally tend not to be addressed.

While a great deal of noise is, no doubt, still made on a regular basis on theissue of corruption both in Parliament and in the general political discourse,there is a relatively cosy arrangement between all parties that politicalposturing will not ordinarily be carried beyond a point where real harm could bedone to the leaderships that fuel or tolerate such corruption.

If corruption was a moral issue alone, its consequences would not be so grave;but it undermines the very foundations of the tasks of nation building. This iseven more the case within the context of the fragile and highly competitiveeconomies of the globalised world order, where corruption allows profits to flowtowards relatively inefficient modes of production and operation, protectingweak systems and undermining long-term capacities for survival and growth.

Corruption also combines with short-term profiteering to divert investment flowsaway from the development of necessary institutional strengths, and into aneconomy of increasing dependency that militates directly against the long-termprospects of the system. And if we go beyond mere economics to comprehend thesocio-political complex that is generated by corruption, we find the privilegingof those who can pay, and an imposition of multiple costs and greaterdeprivation on the poor, who cannot.

This filters down the chain of administration to the lowest levels, victimisingthe powerless and, in the process, delegitimising the state, underminingadministrative institutions and lawful governance, and fuelling a limitlesshatred against the agencies of government and against those who have secured ameasure of prosperity in the country. This, precisely, is what feeds themultiple insurgencies across the country, further undermining the capacities ofthe state to deliver the minimal security and services that a population hasreason to expect from its elected administration.

It is relevant, within this context, to underline the fact that these manyinsurgencies do not, on this argument, represent any measure of hope or reliefto the people. Indeed, these movements of political violence have been uniformlytransformed into organised operations of widespread extortion that not onlydirectly impose unaffordable costs on the poor in both cash and kind, butintentionally obstruct development in wide areas in order to augment and exploitthe resentment and anger of the people against the state's failures to meettheir expectations. The 'revolutionary' parties in India are part of thisorganised thuggery, and the Naxalites are little more than a bunch ofextortionists running a setup that is even more inefficient than the Indianbureaucracy - which is saying a lot.

All our institutions, today, have turned into oligopolistic cabals, run by thesame mindset. This culture cannot leave the corporate ethos unaffected, and ourindustries, our newspapers and media houses, our centres of production, areequally tainted by a collapse of norms and scruples. Large sections of thepolice, customs, direct and indirect tax, and enforcement agencies of the statehave become mirror images of criminal enterprises. And ruling all this is thepolitical class which has no historical memory, no vision of the future, and noshame. Unless we shed this mentality and get rid of the enveloping culture ofextortion and loot, we cannot take the task of nation building forward.

K.P.S. Gill is former director-general of police,Punjab. He is also Publisher, SAIR and President, Institute for ConflictManagement. This article was first published in The Pioneer.