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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Sonia's drive to counter corruption

Sonia's drive to counter corruption

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published Published on Dec 21, 2010   modified Modified on Dec 21, 2010

Congress President Sonia Gandhi's five-point plan to counter corruption, announced during the recent plenary session of the party and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's offer to appear before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on the spectrum scam are, on paper, reasonable measures aimed at reversing the toll the series of scams and controversies have taken on the government.

But without concrete action and setting up of mechanisms which can effectively implement counter-corruption measures, such talk will remain mere symbolism. Given the levels of corruption in India , countering it will need systemic reforms, followed through with determination.

One of the main problems with the Indian system is that politics has come to mean power for pelf, and reforming the political system must be one of the main aims, envisaged as a project shared across the political spectrum. Some of the measures outlined by Sonia Gandhi at the plenary session, such as fast-tracking corruption cases against politicians and public servants, transparency in public procurements and protection to whistleblowers, as well as ending the government's discretionary powers to allocate land and award contracts, make eminent sense. She also posited the issue of changing the system of financing elections, which must be one of the cornerstones of our political reform project. For, the wider, deeper, issue is how political parties are funded in the country, leading to massive amounts of unaccounted cash flowing unaudited through the system.

One way out could be state funding of elections, with the issue of who will be entitled, and to what extent, being decided, for example, on the basis of the percentage of votes garnered by different political parties in the most recent general elections, with in-built mechanisms to deal with new parties or independents. It is common knowledge that funding for political parties mostly consists of cash inflows, making disclosure and auditing virtually impossible. A way out could be making donations to parties strictly payable through cheques. Transparency, at least, will enable some accountability.


The Economic Times, 22 December, 2010, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/editorial/sonias-drive-to-counter-corruption/articleshow/7142726.cms


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