Corruption and Inflation – Where India Stands on Completion of One Year of BJP Government

By Deepak Parvatiyar

May 28, 2015

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A message recently went viral on internet – if a mug has to be chained in a public toilet for fear that it may get stolen, how can one expect corruption to be curbed?

How true!  In spite of all those sermons on corruption, the fact remains that no one has ever eliminated corrupt practices and only the benchmark of corruption changes from time to time.

Transparency International – the global coalition against corruption – says “corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain…” Obviously, this “abuse” of power has much larger connotation and could not be confined only to corrupt actions but even corrupt thoughts and vested designs.

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In Indian context, where corruption in recent times emerged as the biggest poll issue and led to change of governments at the Centre as well as in the states, public expectations have soared from the new dispensation at the helm. After all, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had got an overwhelming majority in the general election last year largely by targeting  the “scam-tainted” Congress-led United Progress Government then. Corruption indeed had constituted the core of Modi’s poll campaign! It still is as Modi misses no chance to refer to the “clean slate” of his government till now, although his detractors openly accuse him of favouring crony capitalism. (Refer tohttp://www.elections.in/blog/the-modi-adani-relationship/)

The completion of one year of the Narendra Modi government in office on 26th May – made to be a high profile extravaganza by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party – therefore, makes a case to assess the achievements of Modi in tackling corruption.

Yet this requires some gumption considering the fact and for which the Congress now attacks the BJP, that 20 of Modi’s ministers faced criminal cases and 11 ministers faced serious criminal cases like attempted murder, inciting communal disharmony and electoral violations, at the time of their induction in the ministry! Besides, ever since coming to power, the NDA has not shown the urgency to fill up vacancies in constitutional and statutory bodies like the Central Information Commission, Central Vigilance Commission, Chief Election Commission.
These institutions are meant to ensure probity in public life and the government’s delay in filling up the vacancies is inexplicable. Consider these:

• a) The post of Chief Information Commissioner is lying vacant for past eight months and the posts of three information commissioners in the CIC are lying vacant for almost a year. As a result, over 39,000 Right To Information (RTI) appeals are pending and a decision of the government to transfer the financial powers of CIC to a government-appointed Secretary in DoPT, which is under direct control of PMO on March 11,2015, has come under much criticism.
• b) The post of Chief Vigilance Commissioners as well as  Vigilance Commissioners are lying vacant since September last year.
• c) Even though the Lokpal Act was passed by the UPA government in December 2013, the new government has not shown any urgency to appoint the Lokpal and there is no Lokpal yet.

It goes without saying that procrastination in filling up these vacancies does not do any good to the government on the issue of corruption, particularly against the backdrop of a recent statement by Modi’s immediate predecessor and much maligned former Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh, who charged: “There are two constant themes of the BJP’s leadership. One, that the UPA was a very corrupt government…. And still the BJP government keeps on harping on the theme of corruption, just because it wants to detract the attention of people to non-issues.”

Singh deftly linked corruption with the issue of non-performance. In other words, this implied that Modi constantly alludes to corruption of the previous government to hide his own failure in governance.

Yet corruption and governance cannot be viewed separately and it is here that even Modi has to establish his credentials. The last one year has been a mixed bag. Obviously in the last one year, there is no financial scam reported. India is now expected to pass China this year to become the world’s fastest-growing large economy. Consider these positives on the economic front under Modi:

• a) The Foreign Exchange Reserve has increased to Rs. 22,499.8 billion as on 8 May 2015 from Rs. 18,852.8 billion as on 9 May 2014.
• b) Industrial production, has increased by 2.10 percent in March 2015 over the same month in the previous year.
• c) Manufacturing has recorded the highest increase of 2.2 percent.
• d) Electricity output has increased by 2 percent.
• e) Mining has gone up 0.9 percent during the year.
• f) The Consumer Price Index inflation has slowed down for the second consecutive month to 4.87 percent in April 2015 from an upwardly revised 5.25 percent in March, because of lower food prices.

Dr. Singh though contends that “In the last one year, BJP government had to manufacture, modify some statistical data to show that this last one year has not been that bad for the economy. But their own people are of the view that the recovery that they talk about is a very fragile recovery.”

Dr. Singh may be right but nonetheless, he seems frustrated because, as he said at the national convention of National Students Union of India on 27th May, “Many of our programs are now being marketed as initiatives of the Modi government. What the BJP had opposed when we were in power is now being sold as its contribution.”

Besides, such lamentations cannot make a case to discredit Modi and in these columns we did mention that to make policies and schemes is one thing, and to execute them is another.(http://www.elections.in/blog/has-modi-government-merely-repackaged-former-upa-governments-key-schemes/)

Yet, there are some serious economic issues indeed, for which the government has been targeted by the Opposition parties, that definitely need an early explanation from the government.  An important and contentious issue is the government’s apparent ‘U-turn’ on one of the BJP’s poll promises – to ensure minimum 50 percent  profits over the cost of production in Agriculture. The government though has now filed an affidavit (dated 6th February, 2015 in Supreme Court) to claim that the ‘Cost+50%’ formula was not possible. The issue has already snowballed into a major controversy and given the Congress enough ammunition – particularly after the controversial land acquisition bill – to brand the government as “anti farmer” at a time when unseasonal rains resulted in a slump in agriculture growth, which has gone down from 4.7 per cent in 2013-14 to 1.1 per cent in 2014-15 (Economic Survey 2015).

Yet another contentious issue is that of black money – a major poll plank of the BJP in the last general elections. Although the BJP leaders, Modi included, had promised to bring back black money stacked overseas to the country within 100 days of coming to power, on 17th October, 2014,  the new Union Government, through an affidavit filed in Supreme Court, expressed its helplessness in disclosing the names of account holders citing the Double Taxation Avoidance Agreements as well as “international standards on maintaining confidentiality”.

The Congress has now claimed not a single rupee has come to India since Modi Government took over. It points out that not even a single Double Taxation Avoidance Agreements, which enable two countries to share information regarding account holders’ wealth of their respective citizens so as to curb black money transactions, has been signed by the BJP after coming to power.

These are serious charges and the government needs to come clean on them. Modi’s controversial statement made in Seoul (South Korea) recently “Earlier, you felt ashamed of being born Indian. Now you feel proud to represent the country” – has been condemned both by the Opposition parties and social media as well. Yet, it shows that he treats the twin issues of corruption and governance as interlinked. But he needs to perform to convince his detractors that

• 1) There is no “corruption” in his thought process.
• 2) His promises and policies are achievable.

The second point is important also because as the then Gujarat Chief Minister, although Modi had signed 30,434 MOUs in five bi-annual Gujarat global Investor summits between 2003-2011 for around Rs 40 lakh crores, the conversion rate of these investment proposals in the state was a mere 12.6 per cent!

A year gone, Modi though could look back with certain degree of satisfaction. His second year in office as Prime Minister indeed would be the time when people would expect  realization of his promises and efforts in more tangible terms  –  to weed out corruption for a prosperous India!