Evolution
of two Acts, RTI and Lokpal, tells us the evolution of the political corruption
in India. Like the struggle for these pro-public Acts, decades old, political
corruption in India has always been a reality since the independence.
As
the time moved on, consumerism increased. Commercial interests became paramount
and started dictating the geopolitical stakes. Saturation of markets forced the
developed world economy to look further for big markets. The global
policymaking intended to pressurize the developing countries that were ready
stocks to serve as the big markets. Among others, China and India were the
natural options owing to their huge population stacks.
Forced
by their internal conflicts and the external pressure, China and India
including others adopted liberal policies and opened up their economies. Like
others, India, too, has seen the big gains since. Initially, the country served
as a market. But now it is a manufacturing hub with a thriving knowledge
economy based on the services sector.
The
country has seen rapid growth in economic parameters since the opening up of
the economy in 1991 (the subsequent
growth in the social indicators has been and is a matter of concern – and corruption
of the ruling class is the major culprit behind this dent). Inflow of the
foreign capital has been regularly on the rise. Multinationals are coming to
India. Indian companies are going transnational.
There
has been flurry of activity on the policy front owing to these developments.
And these policies are framed by the politicians in consultation (collusion should be a better term owing to
the widespread misuse of them) with the senior bureaucrats under intense
lobbying by the industrialists.
Though
the growth began in 1991, we can say till 2000, it was the foundation period
given the explosion some
sectors saw in the post-2000 period; the sectors that have created new
avenues of wealth generation. Spectacular growth in telecom and the services
sector including the ITES led to the creation of huge chunks of jobs in metros and big cities.
That forced migration of multitudes. That subsequently led to the related infrastructure
boom. Land prices increased astronomically. Increased migration and demand of
more investment created an atmosphere to develop a robust public infrastructure
investing heavily (unaccountably in this
case) in projects like highways, civic amenities and power generating
plans.
All
these were policy issues. Policymakers were to decide on telecom policies. Policymakers
were to define the land categories to satiate the demand created by the boom. Policymakers
were to chose (tender process has been a
big sham) whom to award the contracts of the public infrastructure spends.
The
nexus (politician + industrialist + bureaucrat) saw a big opportunity and
started milking the cow. The rapid explosion in the sectors mentioned above
scaled up the magnitude of their scams manifold.
Now
when we go back to the trajectory of the RTI Act and the proposed Lokpal Act,
we see some basic differences based on the common thread of the corruption of the
ruling elite.
To
continue..