The season of scams

It is an extended season of scams with the latest “toothpaste” variety literally taking the cake. The race for distinction started with the games when even footpaths and racetracks literally transformed themselves into mints.  The 2G, NRHM and the ideal scam (adarsh) followed with the ideal setting new peaks with the high and mighty literally usurping the rights of those who laid their lives for the nation.  And there have been many more and tempered by age and the sheer numbers, my memory is not able to keep pace.

The only good thing about the scams is that they have not been petty and the figures have never fallen foul of a couple of tens of thousands of crores. Yes, it appears that the nation has indeed made it to the big league and shall never again be found wanting if ever nations are ranked on the basis of “moolah” made by those who sit on the roof.

And why not? Corruption is now our national fabric and why single out the high and mighty? Petty corruption has almost engulfed the nation and no service or sector has been left untouched.  Any business with the sarkar at any level, cutting across sectors and shades of governance is invariably tainted by the customary greasing of palms.

Even definitions have changed. Corrupt is either the one who rakes in the moolah yet never delivers or who charges rates beyond the established norms. Gone are the days when government service was a noble means to serve the society, now it is simply a lifestyle. Gone are those youngsters who joined service with bubbly enthusiasm and loads of principles. Now what the start-ups look forward to are loads of “moolah” and bubbly lifestyles. What a change in the last two or maybe three decades.

Corruption of the professional kind is not even blinked at. Highly damaging, yet it does not invite even raised eyebrows and that is indeed a cause for concern. The entire fabric has become so corrupted that it is almost an impossibility for any one, within or outside the system to be able to deal with the system in a straight way. And yet the masters, both political and bureaucratic merely skirt the most important issue plaguing the nation in favor of the ordinary and the mundane, and that too merely to give a semblance of earning their salaries.

So why blame the top alone. It is almost like the kettle blaming the pot and this game shall continue unblemished till the time the system does not change the way decisions are taken and contracts are entered into. Unfortunately the realization that the rabid complexity of the tantra has led to low deliverance and demise of value based systems has not yet dawned on the powers that be.

Amen!