India has been ranked as having one of the world’s worst bureaucracy and one of the most corrupt too. The new UPA government has also decided to improve the public delivery system and reform bureaucracy as a constituent of its core agenda. Considering that they made similar promises five years ago and have not been able to deliver on that front – it calls for an introspection on what are the causes and to understand what can be done.
I think the root of corruption is the pay inequality between an officer of the Indian government and the people whom they are supposed to govern. Lets take the example of the Income Tax Department. If you do not pay officers a good amount of money they are likely to feel bitter, when they realise that their own conditions of life are average as compared to their assesses who time and again exploit loop holes in laws to unethical legal transactions to save money. Their status of living doesn’t match up to the powers vested in them. I think it is a bit of feeling cheated and jealousy that cause corruption. I am a firm believer that people do not get bitter at their own bad conditions, but at the good conditions of others.
Another reason for corruption is lack of swift prosecution and judicial mediation in disputes. Successive governments in India have been undermining the authority of institutions to use them for personal gains. It is a relic of the socialism and scarce resource theory of Indira. It is imperative to bring judicial reforms in the country, to clear the backlog of cases and to make judges accountable for giving good quality judgements and not sitting on them. They have been given a leeway for a long long time. It is an institution for the service of the public and must act to deliver it. It simply beats the logic that judges need good 2 months summer holidays every year, even when there is so much to be done.
Thirdly, implementation of IT system in day to day working of government, so that a lot of information is disclosed to the civilians. It is again ridiculous that we can track a shipment throughout the globe but not a file in government department. Moreover, the implementation of IT will automate a lot of clerical work and reduce hierarchy leading to accountability.
I think the beginning has been done by introducing the sixth pay commission and a blue print has been built by law minister. But still, i think the judicial reforms and strengthening of institutions will take a lot of time and political will. This is because the relevance of the people who are supposed to reform the institutions depend on making the institutions subservient to their wishes. I think the hope here is Rahul Gandhi who doesnt need on running down institutions to gather legitimacy in front of voters. It will be nice to see how institutions are built in these five years.
