I was wondering about the new India rising up. We are all rising up. Up up and Up. Up against what i wonder? Somebody whispered its up against corruption? The one word that has become the motto of every man, woman and child in India. We all wont corruption to end like it is Ravana from Ramayana itself. And if there is Ravana we need a Ram. And we found our Ram in Mr. Anna Hazare.
Its pretty convenient actually. Someone started a small fire promising food and we all join in for free food. I mean anyhow we don’t believe we can cook by ourselves so we decided to move into a house where someone will cook for us and who knows even feed us!
Lets go back to Corruption. Yeah i fucking hate corruption. That’s what i say, you say and so does everyone else. And we hope that Anna Hazare will wave a magic wand and it will end corruption. Like in Harry Potter isn’t it? One flick and it vanishes! And what then? No corruption, life is great right!
Yeah it is great. Let me give you a scenario. You go to a government office. You want to get your property registered. The guy sitting at the table in front of you gets paid 20,000 a month and at age of 40 he has a family to manage at 20K a month. Its the same money a lot of people spend on just eating out in a month ( vast majority of the anti-corruption movement ). So now that guy is frustrated with his meager salary. And since Lokpal is passed, well corruption has vanished isnt it? So he wont take a bribe.
And so you would come to this office day in and day out and try to get your work done. But there is no incentive for anyone to work. What does it matter to him whether he clears your file or not? He’s still going to get the same 20k a month. So who the fuck are you to him?
I guess a lot of people who have read till here would say that this means i support Corruption. No i do not! But Lokpal wont give you the solution. The solution lies in raising the standard of living of the country. The solution lies in better economic conditions. The solution lies in giving incentive to people to get their work done efficiently!
Fasting and holding a country to ransom is doing nothing but reducing our economic output. It is a movement that in-essence would increase corruption and not reduce it. It would add another layer to already complex multi-layered system we have and give another set of people a chance to profit out of it.
If the guy in front of you in a government office had an incentive to get your work done, he would do it without money. Let the government create a system that would be linked to incentives. Let people pay money and decide the worth of the work they need.
Another cause of corruption is the complexity. If buying land was as simple as logging on a website, fill some forms, select a property, scan and upload documents and go to payment page, WOULD WE EVER PAY BRIBES FOR THIS? We wont! So we need to reduce the complexity of the system and not add another LOKPAL to it!
“No i do not! But Lokpal wont give you the solution. The solution lies in raising the standard of living of the country. The solution lies in better economic conditions.”
Only true to some extent . I guess people are more angry with corrupt millionaires(read: politicians) looting billions away . kalamadi did not eat money because he didn’t earn much … but it is the impunity in India … anyone can get away after looting billions . Having a strong law is the first step .. not that I undermine the importance of properly implementing it .. see Arvind’s video to know why current laws are toothless
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Giving incentives, and replacing humans by computers is a solution for many stituations, but not all … Even in US, I have to visit government offices for things like getting driving licence and social secutiry cards … untill we have reliable technologies to automate them, we need to have strong deterrants for public officers
Excellent thought process, I too agree with this. Implementing Lokpal will create a new set of “Inspectors” in system. This can be eliminated by only Transparent IT System.
Regards
Rajiv
Dude pranay, nice post I see you have a point you are conveying…
however, I’d like to add some more :
* It’s true that most gov/state employess are underpaid/don’t have a proper worklife/sal. (read Indian Police… where an inspector gets a meagre salary)
* Dude, you are right that Lokpal adds to the complexity… but we are at a point where restructuring everything from the scratch seems a distant possiblity …. considering how much we have changed our laws,methods,etc since independence since the britishers handed over our country to us. 😛
(btw… we still use the same laws they passed on to us)
True, this Anna Hazare movement has become a fad….most indians are jumping in just hearing the name “Anti-corruption bill” but what Anna said is palatable : that this won’t curb corruption, but say reduce it to 60 % if implemented properly….. given the prevalant scenario in the country.
I would say even I am not sure how far this bill or lokpal thing will go…. but still I would say for now I am a bit more inclined to see this bill get passed…..( assuming how RTI had made it’s impact ) 🙂
-Saumitra
I think the real change will come when people start taking pride in whatever they are doing. I dont know how that would happen, maybe by monetary incentives, maybe moral, I dont know but I think its the most important.
Like in these two months I have been in delhi I encountered two totally different scenarios. I applied for a vodafone postpaid, and inspite of the problem of address proof(and its verification), the vodafone guy processed my application without troubling me just on the basis of trust. Whereas in a totally different scenario, I havent managed to get an airtel internet connection till now even after 4 weeks and with proper documents. Its just that this airtel guy is just not motivated enough.(Should I bribe him??? 😛 )
I agree that people are resorting to Anna for their fight; but its just a beginning and from now on whenever someone is found guilty of public fund embezzlement it will cost him dearly. Personally i think that in these 64 yrs politicians have become omnipotent in lot of sense now its time to imbibe slight fear in them too. All will be right then I hope.
Moreover, small bribes (i don’t know somber word for it, tip?) to make things easier isn’t going to harm anyone 😉
We shouldn’t be impractical idealist.
You completed a few fine points there. I did a search on the issue and found nearly all folks will have the same opinion with your blog.