EDITORIAL
Corruption: to go beyond
rhetoric
During the last one month
we have been exposed to a lot of talk about corruption.
Ministers have admitted its existence in their own
departments. One of them has of course resigned for
having allegedly accepted bribe. Forest Minister Qazi
Afzal has blamed corruption for having destroyed green
gold. Deputy Chief Minister Muzaffar Hussain Baig is
anguished: "It is unfortunate that corruption has
become 'nasoor' (bleeding wound) and is knee deep in our
society. The Chief Minister and even we wanted to
eradicate it but the system is so rotten that it is very
difficult to get rid of it." He has said: "I am
feeling suffocated for the last several days. I was
thinking for the last few days to quit…It is one
thing to talk against corruption but quite another to
carry its body on shoulders and find at least two yards
of land to bury it. . For how long we carry this corpse
on the shoulders and go on searching space for its final
burial. It is not easy to change the system unless you
have get support from all." As a consequence,
according to Mr Baig, politics has become a coal mine
where even a clean person runs the risk of being tainted.
"We require moral courage and resilience to fight
corruption at all levels and free the society from its
evils. If my being in power does not make a difference
then I don't want to retain it... Our integrity is at
stake as we are answerable to the public." Almost
similar sentiments have been echoed by Mr A.R. Rather,
Leader of the Opposition in the State Assembly:
"Corruption has entered deep into the system. If a
legislator is forced to pay bribe for a genuine work we
can imagine the fate of a common man. For the past five
years we have been crying hoarse against corruption in
politics and bureaucracy. However, it has met with deaf
ears". For his part the Chief Minister, Mr Ghulam
Nabi Azad, has been speaking of a crusade against
corruption almost every day. Mr Baig belongs to the
People's Democratic Party and Mr Rather to the National
Conference. The Chief Minister is a Congress leader.
Among three of them they cover a wide spectrum of
politics. Why is it that even then they are not able to
eradicate the menace?
Bribery is just one facet
of corruption. Its other ugly heads are: political
corruption, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, patronage,
graft and embezzlement. It is a disease not confined to
politics alone. There is hardly any field which is immune
from it. One former bureaucrat has aptly remarked:
"That corruption is respectful in India is because
people in respectable professions indulge in it. Despite
their lack of morality, strangely, their opinion matters
-- from Marx to markets -- in every public domain."
It is not a secret that on a global scale our country is
rated as one of the most corrupt. Within the country our
State enjoys this dubious distinction. Moreover, we in
this State are at the centre of national and
international intrigues. Hardly a week passes without one
hawala transaction or the other not coming to light on
both sides of the Pir Panjal. Does it not appear strange
that despite terrorism there has been a visible boom in
some sectors in the Kashmir Valley especially? How does
one explain this? The reason for dishonesty is
greediness. It is easy to say that bribe giver is as
guilty as the bribe taker. The reality is that ordinary
masses are forced to pay bribes to get even routine
things done. The outburst of independent legislator
Shoaib Lone in the Assembly has effectively underlined
this point. Electoral system is also faulted for giving a
boost to fraudulent financial transactions. This is
despite well-intentioned ceiling imposed on poll
expenses. Should one then accept this wicked phenomenon
as something with which one has to live for ever? What
should one do in a situation in which ministers too feel
helpless?
If nothing else we can
draw inspiration from those who have stood up against the
monster. Lucky as we are for living in the land of
Mahatma Gandhi we have several sterling examples around
us. There is a piece of advice for our political class:
"To destroy this invisible government, to dissolve
the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt
politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the
day." If a minister is sincere and forthright the
message goes down the line. If he selectively interprets
his actions and sheds crocodile tears his words don't
carry conviction. That is why there is universal truth:
"To ensure that our gains are not dissipated through
corruption, we must improve our moral standards as we
create fertile ground for good governance based on a
sound moral foundation, a philosophy of transparency and
an ethic of effective implementation." One has just
to recall the stir that a comparatively small civic
official G.R. Khairnar had created by his drive against
unauthorised encroachments in Mumbai. His famous
one-liner is very relevant: "Today one does not have
to be a revolutionary to create a storm. Being honest is
enough." His personal experience is revealing:
"It is possible to be honest in a world rampant with
corruption.. Possible, but very, very difficult.
Colleagues deprived of their share of ill-earned booty
make life difficult in the office. The honest officer
also earns the ire of superiors who are themselves under
tremendous pressure from political bosses. Memos may be
sent. Inquiry committees bent on vindication may be
ordered against the erring official and transfers may be
affected. The officer may also find himself framed in a
legal trap. Life becomes difficult. Thus hated, isolated,
and beaten, an honest man feels lonely and confused. What
makes it a hard battle and an unfair one is the honest
man's inability to pay his legal bills. His scrupulous
honesty pits him against powerful vested interests. He
has to fight on his own." In short, we live in a
cesspool of corruption. Quite a few of us keep holding
our noses against this stink. A willingness to clean it
is a matter of character. When will we be able to breathe
some fresh air?
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Subsidies
aren’t all that bad
By Sisir
Basu
The Government has
once again decided to increase
the prices of petrol and diesel
by Rs. 2 and Re. 1. Over the last
two years this would be for the
fifth time that the Government is
resorting to price increase in
view of rising oil prices in the
international market. Why pass on
the burden of increased prices to
the consumers when there exist
mechanism to tackle the situation
by way of subsidizing oil prices.
It is high time the
Government re-evaluated its
obsession with removing subsidies
on oil prices and opted for a
long-term energy policy based on
the nation's needs. Exposing
Indian industry and consumers to
the vicissitudes of global prices
by either dismantling the
Administrative Price Mechanism or
attacking the Oil Pool Account
(OPA) are proving too burdensome
for the national economy because
we have to simultaneously
dismantle import tariff
boundaries in keeping with our
WTO commitments.
The OPA is meant to
be self-financing over a period,
unless the government takes away
the surplus. The APM
(administered price mechanism) is
based on the retention concept
under which refineries; marketing
companies and pipelines are
compensated for the operating
costs and are allowed a return of
12 per cent post-tax net worth.
The efficiency of the APM depends
entirely on the ability of the
system to keep the OPA in
balance. Until the late 1980's,
the account was in surplus and it
had become an extra source of
income for the Government.
However, the 1990's saw a growing
deficit. By 1997, the OPA
recorded a deficit of $5 billion.
Unfortunately, in India, the
Government has in the past taken
away massive amounts of money
from the OPA and utilised the
surplus to meet the increasing
revenue gap. If the domestic
price of refined petroleum is
allowed to go up and down, most
industries, and particularly the
transport sector, would be unable
to cope with the resultant
uncertainties. Farmers and
ordinary Indians will suffer as
well.
The
"reformers" have
pointed out the inefficiency of
the subsidy system. The effects
are mainly on those products that
are very important industrial raw
materials for steel, cement, and
chemical industries, the backbone
of any modern economy.
If we add the recent
decisions by the
"reformers" to reduce
import taxes on products already
produced in India, the total
effects of the combined attacks
of high price of petroleum, lower
import taxes and a strong rupee
will devastate Indian industries.
India's Rs. 1, 30,000-crore
chemical industry, the backbone
of the country's basic industry,
is undergoing a silent
transition. The overall impact
would be serious. Also, there has
been a sharp drop in import
tariffs, posing significant
challenges to the chemical
industry. The argument that lower
import tariffs would encourage
more foreign investment is
unfounded. Even when the entry
barriers have been pulled down,
there has been no significant
improvement in FDI levels. In
China, energy demands are rising
constantly to keep up with
economic growth. The country is
already expected to pay an extra
$9.2 billion to import the 980
million barrels of oil it needs
this year. Government price
adjustments have protected
emerging Chinese consumers from
the jump in international energy
prices. There is a debate over
whether China's massive crude
import for this year, up about 40
per cent from 2005, represents
real demand. Some analysts reckon
the Chinese Government has
ordered state oil companies to
hold inventories. China may have
stocked as much as 300 million
barrels of oil since early last
year. Chinese officials said work
is going on to build the initial
phase of a strategic oil
stockpile, which could start to
be filled within the next year.
What should India
do? It is unfortunate that rather
than having comprehensive energy
planning, India, since 1991, has
abandoned planning altogether and
decided to go along with a
mysterious "economic
reform" policy. The result
is the present crisis. The
solution for India is to go back
to the comprehensive planning of
the energy sector and the
economy, as one cannot happen
without the other.
The transport
policy, based on road system and
private transport, is unfeasible
for India given its limited
petroleum reserves. India should
develop public transport system
based on electricity and develop
more and more railway transport
instead of road transport. Given
the massive coal reserves for
thermal power plants and India's
expertise with nuclear power, it
is the best option. There should
be subsidies for solar energy,
which can meet the demands from
the residential sector in a big
way. Private ownership of cars
should be discouraged by tax
increases on car ownership. In
public transport, electricity
instead of petroleum can be used
in a big way by converting
diesel-fuelled buses into trolley
buses which can run on
electricity with the same speed.
Trams, restricted only to
Kolkata, should be introduced in
every city and in the link road
between the cities and nearby
towns. More railway lines should
opened between the major cities.
In these ways, the demand for oil
from the transport and the
residential sector can be
controlled. However, industrial
demands for petroleum cannot be
reduced without major changes in
technology. For that case, import
controls and increased tariffs on
imports to protect Indian
domestic industries and to reduce
India's total import cost are the
answer.
The recent crisis is
the result of the false doctrine
of "economic reforms"
and the unwise decision of the
Ministry of Finance to withdraw
money from the OPA without
compensating it when needed.
Without subsidies, the costs will
escalate and in the near future
the government will be forced, to
give either direct subsidies to
the industries and farmers, or to
provide special loans and
tax-breaks to help them to
recover. The eventual cost will
be much more than the subsidies
for the OPA.
Another fear is the
growing inflation due to the rise
in domestic prices of oil
products, which would affect the
poor much more than the
industrialists or rich farmers.
If the government wants to reduce
inflation by increasing the
interest rate, the cost of
borrowing will go up; there will
be more industrial failures and
unemployment. These are the
perils of a privatised economy,
which a planned economy can avoid
easily through cross subsidies
and direct infusion of
investments.
The costs of
subsidies to the OPA are very
insignificant compared to the
uncollected tax (about Rs. 95,000
crore) or the unpaid loans (about
Rs. 150,000 crore) from the
nationalised banks. If the
government would make tax
avoidance a criminal offence and
use bankruptcy procedures as the
mandatory instrument to collect
both unpaid loans and taxes, the
revenue situation of the
government will improve
significantly. As a result, the
country can tide over this crisis
of the oil-price-rise easily
without throwing the burden on
the poor. INAV
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Rahul
must unwrap his vision
By
Amulya Ganguli
Within
days of reports that
Rahul Gandhi had spent a
night in a Dalit
household, television
channels showed him
taking lessons in
paragliding. The gulf
between these two novel
experiences for the new
Congress general
secretary underlined the
distance that he would
have to cover before he
could hope to be accepted
as a figure of importance
on the political scene
and not a dilettante to
whom politics is a
part-time occupation.
To
be fair, the lifestyle of
major personalities in
Indian politics has
generally had the stamp
of the upper class, and
was consequently far
removed from the
quotidian lives of
ordinary people. The
apocryphal story of the
noted Bengali Congressman
of the pre-independence
period, J.M.Sengupta,
asking his valet to lay
out his "meeting ka
kapda" typified this
distance. Only the
Mahatma tried seriously
to bridge the gulf, but
his efforts provoked
Sarojini Naidu's
part-cynical,
part-humorous comment:
"if the Mahatma only
knew how much it cost the
Congress to keep him
poor".
It
is not being suggested
that unless the leader
lives like a follower, he
cannot inspire trust. On
the contrary, the
followers usually prefer
their leaders to be a cut
above them - even a
patrician like Jyoti Basu
with a touch of hauteur.
What is more to the
point, however, is that
neither tokenism nor
elitist hobbies can seem
odd if a politician
exhibits certain
qualities of mind and
heart.
For
a start, he must be able
to convincingly
articulate a vision based
on an obvious grasp of
existing realities with
all their nuances. If
Rahul's father and
grandmother could score
sweeping electoral
victories in 1984 and
1971, the reasons were
precisely the fact of
their ability to touch a
chord in the popular
mind, evoking the hope
that their aspirations
would be fulfilled.
The
secret of Rajiv Gandhi's
success, for instance,
was his vision of taking
India into the 21st
century while Indira
Gandhi raised the
expectation of wiping out
poverty. It is another
matter that both amounted
to false promises. Rajiv
Gandhi was mired in the
old Congress malady of
corruption while Indira's
"socialism"
proved to be a fake one.
But, even then, their
achievement was that they
had something distinctive
to say. Rahul's problem
is that so far he has
stuck to routine
political rhetoric
without iterating his own
specific ideas.
Arguably,
a general secretary
cannot freely air his own
views. They must be in
line with the party's,
especially because he is
still regarded as young
and inexperienced. Such
views may also be
misconstrued if he is to
hold forth on subjects
with which he is not
directly concerned. At
the same time, it will be
absurd to claim that he
is just an ordinary
office-bearer. His
special position as a
scion of the party's
first family is no
secret. The deference
shown to him by the other
members is evidence of
his distinctiveness. What
is more, the unwritten
consensus within the
party is that he is
destined for bigger
things.
But,
as of now, there is no
sign that either he is
ready to assume greater
responsibilities or that
he will develop the
capabilities to play a
larger role. It still
seems that he is only in
politics because of the
insistence of his mother
and would have been happy
to lead a private life of
his own. But since he has
taken up, willy-nilly,
what can be described as
his family's profession,
it might have helped if
he had shown an aptitude
for certain skills. Rajiv
Gandhi's training as a
pilot made him familiar
with the world of
computers and modern
gadgetry, which impressed
an India which was still
accustomed to typewriters
being used in offices and
where laptops and ATMs
were unheard of.
It
is possible, of course,
that Rahul has had to be
extra cautious because of
his party's coalition
arrangement at the
Centre. He obviously has
to be careful about what
he thinks, for instance,
about the economic
policies or the nuclear
deal lest he should
ruffle sensitive
feathers. The only time
he is said to have spoken
out on a controversial
subject was when he
countered CPI (M) M.P.
Brinda Karat's opposition
to the entry of foreign
universities during a
parliamentary committee
meeting. But even if he
lets only his elders in
the party to tiptoe
through the minefield of
contentious issues, he
can at least present his
vision of India, as his
great grandfather,
Jawaharlal Nehru, did
when he referred to the
industries and dams as
the temples of new India
and explained how India's
many religions and
cultures had to live in
harmony if the country
was to stay united.
Much
of it may seem
platitudinous, but they
are still highly relevant
at a time when a major
party doesn't mind being
called a Hindu
nationalist organisation
and the small regional
parties continue to
cynically exploit
sectarian sentiments to
build vote banks. As a
young man unattached to
the government but
representing the legacies
of his forebears, Rahul
is someone who can
outline the high
principles behind
customary platitudes with
considerable effect if
only because he commands
greater media and public
attention than any other
general secretary. It
will also show that the
hopes placed in him by
his family and the party
may be fulfilled.(IPA)
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Stealing
organs from the poor
By
Praful Bidwai
No
words are too strong to
condemn the ghoulish and
barbaric kidney
transplantation racket in
the National Capital
Region, with its
frightening scale, brazen
violence against the
victims, and
ramifications across
several states, if not
nations. Dr Amit Kumar
alias Santosh Raut's
massive organ trade
operation involved 3
hospitals, 5 diagnostic
centres and 10
laboratories, and more
than 50 accomplices,
including doctors and
nurses,
"spotters" and
touts who would lure
hundreds of potential
donors with the promise
of jobs, and thugs and
gunmen who would force
them to part with their
kidneys.
The
racket was unearthed
thanks to the initiative
of an earnest young woman
police officer, Manjul
Saini. But it's
inconceivable that it
could have carried on for
years across Uttar
Pradesh, Haryana and
Delhi without collusion
on the part of the
police.
Besides
adding to the Raut gang's
culpability, this
highlights the gravity of
the comprehensive police
failure in enforcing the
law, in particular, the
Transplantation of Human
Organs Act (THOA) 1994,
which illegalises the
sale of human organs and
giving and accepting a
reward for their
donation. The Act allows
organ donations by close
relatives without
government clearance. But
all other relatives wish
to donate must appear
before and be cleared by
an expert Authorisation
Committee.
THOA
however has a big
loophole. It dispenses
with prior approval of
the Committee if the
donor feels
"affection" or
"attachment towards
the recipient". This
is so vague as to permit
extensive mercantile
abuse on a potential
donor's unverifiable
declaration. Most organ
trade racketeers simply
ignore or defy the law,
as Raut did. Since the
entire operation is
illegal and clandestine,
they don't even bother to
use the THOA loophole.
The
Raut racket follows a
familiar pattern, noted
in Chennai, Bangalore and
Hyderabad to Mumbai and
Delhi all the way to
Chandigarh and Amritsar.
Rich clients suffering
from end-stage renal
disease, many of them
foreigners, are contacted
by and drawn into an
international organ trade
network at the centre of
which are unscrupulous
doctors who prey upon the
very poor, who are often
in deep debt. These
potential donors are
misled into believing
they'll get jobs and
eventually induced into
selling a kidney for as
little as Rs 40,000 to a
maximum of Rs 1 lakh.
The
international kidney
bazaar is highly evolved,
with extensive
cross-border transactions
and a hierarchy of
preferences and prices.
Thus, kidneys from India,
Pakistan, Bangladesh or
the Philippines sell for
as little as $1,000 to
2,000. A Romanian kidney
goes for $3,000. A kidney
from Turkey costs $10,000
or more. Mexico, Brazil
and South Africa fall in
between. The victims are
always desperately poor
people who have lost
everything, including
hope.
The
donors are usually
quickly discharged and
left to fend for
themselves without being
warned of possible risks
and hazards from their
surgery. There's no
follow-up treatment nor
an attempt to monitor if
they themselves need
dialysis in case their
remaining kidney
malfunctions in the
future. Many donors end
up ill and destitute-as
soon as they have run
through the money or
partially repaid their
debt.
Many
poor countries have no
laws to regulate organ
trade. In India's case,
the law came years after
the legal kidney
transplants had become an
established business. In
any case, the police have
comprehensively failed to
enforce THOA.
On
a good guess, a major
reason for this failure,
apart from large bribes
paid to ensure its
silence, is the belief
that the victims got a
modicum of
"justice"
because they were
"compensated"
to the extent of Rs
40,000 to 100,000 for the
removal of a kidney, and
that they can, after all,
survive with just one
kidney. The only
"injustice",
many of our law-enforcers
believe, is that of
disproportion: the
racketeering doctors,
middlemen, touts and
brokers make much larger
sums, totalling Rs 15 to
20 lakh.
This
belief, probably shared
by a section of the
Indian elite-which, for
instance, finds nothing
wrong in the use of child
labour-betrays utter
contempt for human life
and the principle of
inviolability of the
human body, which is
foundational to any
civilised society. It
justifies the invasion
and raiding of
flesh-and-blood people to
steal their vital organs,
which don't regenerate
themselves.
True,
there's a big gap between
the numbers affected
thus, estimated at 1.5
lakh in India, and the
number of kidneys
transplanted (under
4,000). Another 6,000 get
dialysis. The rest just
perish. But that gap
can't be filled by
exploiting poor. Rather,
what we need is more and
cheaper dialysis
facilities, cadaver-based
transplants (from the
brain dead), and
encouragement to
patients' relatives to
donate their kidneys.
Kidney donations have few
adverse effects if
properly managed with
follow-up, etc. The
public must be educated
to make kidney donation
pledges much in the way
cornea donation campaigns
appeal to them.
Cadaver-based
transplants are the each
of our major cities every
day. Yet there have been
only 500 cadaver-based
transplants since THOA
came into being. But to
bring the option into
being, we need to
simplify and speed up
cumbersome medico-legal
procedures for organ
donation, create
transplant registries,
and permit
round-the-clock
post-mortem examinations,
besides raising public
awareness.
Unfortunately,
the government seems to
be moving towards easing
organ transplant norms by
diluting THOA and
creating a system of
"incentives"
and allowing
"organ-swapping"
between willing but
incompatible donors. This
may be open to abuse.
Meanwhile,
the problem of preventing
rackets of the Raut kind
cannot be ducked. The
inhuman practice of
violating the bodies of
the destitute and
ultra-vulnerable people
must be firmly put down
and severely punished.
This must provoke serious
and critical reflection
on the neoliberal
economic policies we are
pursuing, under which
growth aggravates
destitution at the bottom
of the social pyramid. It
must also trigger genuine
police reform.
Yet,
there is a smart and
reliable way of detecting
and zeroing on
clandestine organ
transplants. All their
recipients are given
immuno-suppressant drugs
to prevent transplant
rejection, such as
cyclosporin, tacrolimus
and mycophenolate. These
are only made by a
handful of companies like
Roche, Novartis and
Panacea, which know
exactly which
hospitals/clinics order
them. The likes of Raut's
Palam Vihar hospital can
be easily tracked down
and raided. Will the
government muster the
will to do this? (IPA)
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