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Journalism of Courage
• In her column, ‘‘This Budget, factor in C for Corruption’’, Tavleen Singh refers to ‘‘an Income-Tax man called Pramod Kumar Gupta’’. An officer of the Indian Revenue Service (1984), the person in question is my husband for 18 years now. And I am yet to come across a man who lives life on higher values as he has done. The column claims that he was found to be possessing Rs 26 lakhs in cash. Tavleen ought to have verified that information. The CBI found us possessing Rs 26,000, which is, more often than not, less than my three days’ earnings. As regards a house under construction, there is one. And for assets worth Rs 50 lakhs or so, I have a loan of more than Rs 60 lakhs. If the banks have evaluated my professional worth to extend finances at this scale, you can understand that casual references to individuals should best be avoided. It hurts an enterprising woman’s self-respect. Leave it to the CBI to investigate.
—Dr Mridula Gupta
• Corruption has reached alarming levels and could become a national disaster. Lawmakers must take urgent measures to stem the rot. But unfortunately, they are themselves involved in corrupt practices. As do the government officials. Even the judiciary, once thought to be above rebuke, has let the country down. We do not have a government mechanism to keep track of the quantum of public money swindled every year. What we do have is a system that encourages corruption by its acts of commissions and omissions. Political interference in the functioning of the investigating agencies engaged in exposing corruption must stop. The Taj corridor case and the Bihar fodder scam are just two examples.
—V P Damodar
• Since the 1990s, every FM has cursed the parallel economy of black money and promised to herald an era of transparency and accountability. But corruption has become more rampant. The Budget has been reduced to an exercise in political event management. In the latest, rather the most ridiculous, method of checking the growth of black money, Chidambaram has proposed a tax on withdrawals of Rs 10,000 and above. Does he think people keep black money in bank accounts? Is he so naive that he feels a cut-off of Rs 10,000 is sufficient to combat the corruption that runs into crores?
— Ved Guliani
• So much has been written about corruption, yet there is no perceptible decline in corrupt practices. Corruption cannot be controlled by a Budget. It is naive to think that one Minister can do it when the malaise is all pervasive. Most of us are compelled to give a bribe to get things done. That is why corruption survives.
— Narendra M Apte
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