There is room for optimism that India is doing something right as it is one among 64 countries that improved their score, climbing nine places to lie 76th among 168 nations in Transparency International’s 2015 global corruption index. India shares the slot with Thailand, Brazil, Tunisia, Zambia and Burkina Faso, with Brazil, a fellow Brics member, having come down considerably thanks to the petroleum scandal.
The list also comes with the reminder that “corruption remains a blight around the world”. Not that we need a reminder as we witness suspected corruption at the highest levels of political office, which is clearly evidenced on a day in which a former Maharashtra chief minister is in the dock with the CBI wishing to prosecute him in a planning permission scandal, and the serving chief minister of Kerala to soon face an FIR which a vigilance court has ordered in the “solar” graft case.
It is undeniable that every single country is corrupt when measured on the scale of perception of public sector corruption. The vast improvement in India’s score may also be because a number of huge public sector scandals, like the 2G spectrum and coal mine allotment scams, are well behind us.
The promise of a “Digital India” in which more of government decision-making will feature in an open domain might help us better this score. There is a big battle ahead in trying to wipe out the corruption indulged in by netas and babus. At least we have an index that shows how we are faring, relatively speaking.
