School bullies rob younger and weaker children of whatever catches their fancy, be it their lunch, toys or money. The weak and timid merely surrender whatever they have to avoid a beating or other forms of torment.
The situation is not much different for the majority of the people, for they are weak and the bullies are the bureaucrats and political leaders. In this notorious brigade one can also include police officials, teachers, purchase officers, inspectors etc in most institutions.
Not all are bad but the bullies form a dominant majority.
Nowadays no social interaction is complete without a reference to corruption.
Everyone protests and I am flooded with emails asking us to protest and support Anna Hazare etc. Everyone expects that this social activist’s efforts at getting the right legislation passed by parliament after 42 years will free us from the heavy yoke of our own government's corruption. While this is a significant move, it is sadly just a minuscule step in putting the evil genie of corruption back into the lamp. Talk s cheap and assuages our feeling of guilt that while we complain we do nothing. Well conceived strategies and plans implemented sincerely by committed people only will yield results.
Here are some thoughts on the analysis and some proposed solutions if carried out by the second wave of mass protests led by people like Mr. Hazare will solve a lot.
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People love to attack the symptom rather than the disease. The root cause of the disease of corruption, is the massive number of laws vesting dangerous punitive powers in almost every officer in the government. Even the junior-most officer can put in jail any member of the public with a snap of their fingers. Another root cause is the ability to obstruct normal personal, social and business life. The harried citizens have to spend huge resources of money and time in legal fees, bribes and the courts to prove their innocence or to get what is rightly due to them as envisaged in our constitution.
To make matters worse there is no system to redress complaints of the people. Where and to whom can the frustrated and exhausted citizen turn to?
In addition to throwing the legal book at citizens , many government officials cruelly leverage the media to their advantage and hammer the oppressed people by issuing malicious statements in the newspapers and television about the person being charged with some offense or the other.
Often destroying reputations and lives thoughtlessly, the media's focus unfortunately has shifted from providing balanced news to entertainment, and nothing entertains more than the whiff of scandal.
Preventing corruption is better than trying to cure it. Here are some ways to mitigating the menace of corruption;
Reduce the powers of government and other officers to bully, that is to act arbitrarily to arrest people, shut down businesses, etc for most matters and instead follow a system of due process of law. The offender should be given a notice and permitted to defend themselves.
It must be appreciated that bullies are impatient people and pursue instant gratification. Deny them this right to bully, harass, obstruct and destroy and most of the frivolous or mischievous cases of harassment will die a natural death.
True, a few offenders may escape the net of the law but surely a countless more innocents will also escape the harassment of corrupt officials.
The situation is not much different for the majority of the people, for they are weak and the bullies are the bureaucrats and political leaders. In this notorious brigade one can also include police officials, teachers, purchase officers, inspectors etc in most institutions.
Not all are bad but the bullies form a dominant majority.
Nowadays no social interaction is complete without a reference to corruption.
Everyone protests and I am flooded with emails asking us to protest and support Anna Hazare etc. Everyone expects that this social activist’s efforts at getting the right legislation passed by parliament after 42 years will free us from the heavy yoke of our own government's corruption. While this is a significant move, it is sadly just a minuscule step in putting the evil genie of corruption back into the lamp. Talk s cheap and assuages our feeling of guilt that while we complain we do nothing. Well conceived strategies and plans implemented sincerely by committed people only will yield results.
Here are some thoughts on the analysis and some proposed solutions if carried out by the second wave of mass protests led by people like Mr. Hazare will solve a lot.
________________________________________
People love to attack the symptom rather than the disease. The root cause of the disease of corruption, is the massive number of laws vesting dangerous punitive powers in almost every officer in the government. Even the junior-most officer can put in jail any member of the public with a snap of their fingers. Another root cause is the ability to obstruct normal personal, social and business life. The harried citizens have to spend huge resources of money and time in legal fees, bribes and the courts to prove their innocence or to get what is rightly due to them as envisaged in our constitution.
To make matters worse there is no system to redress complaints of the people. Where and to whom can the frustrated and exhausted citizen turn to?
In addition to throwing the legal book at citizens , many government officials cruelly leverage the media to their advantage and hammer the oppressed people by issuing malicious statements in the newspapers and television about the person being charged with some offense or the other.
Often destroying reputations and lives thoughtlessly, the media's focus unfortunately has shifted from providing balanced news to entertainment, and nothing entertains more than the whiff of scandal.
Preventing corruption is better than trying to cure it. Here are some ways to mitigating the menace of corruption;
- Reduce discretionary and instant punitive powers of individual officers by 95%.
- Introduce an effective system to redress complaints of the citizens and this should form part of the senior officers duties and action taken must be open to public scrutiny.
- Various and relevant trade associations, guilds and organisations working in tandem with the various bar councils review ALL laws over the next five years and withdraw, modify or add laws that are needed. More than 70% of the laws are irrelevant or outdated and unduly complex and sometimes even convoluted.
- Introduce universally that unless genuine and valid objections are raised applications to government departments and officers will be deemed to be automatically sanctioned for most routine things.
