An interesting part of the recent occurrences we have lived from one scandal to another has been a fascinating avoidance of anything remotely resembling a reliance on rules,or even a positive statement of acceptable behaviour in order to castigate impropriety. Given our very low level of civic consciousness,a tax demand,or an audit objection,or even a casual conversation with persons of dubious integrity is not treated differently from large-scale criminal fraud,bribery or corruption. In this Kafkaesque world the border line between fact,insinuation and fiction becomes blurred.
Going very infrequently to the capital anyway fogged out we got an opportunity to reflect on the shenanigans reported there with friends of ours,other law-abiding people from regional centres and elsewhere,some of whom were holding so-called responsible positions. The first question we posed them was whether it was true that the entire system,or even a large part of it,was corrupt. I wondered about that; for,as a much younger man,during one of my stints in government,it was thought that perhaps less than a tenth of my secretary-level colleagues were of doubtful integrity. They would frequent embassy and corporate parties,but were kept out of the loop of serious work. The general reaction to my question was that this was still true. Some felt the percentage may be higher; some contested that. These were senior civil servants,jurists,journalists and academics; but they were reasonably alert persons,and it is likely that they have a reasonable perspective on reality. So if everybody,or even a large majority,is not for sale we can avoid thinking of ourselves as a banana republic.
I was not too happy with this argument. There was nothing in principle that suggested that centralised regimes were less corrupt. I felt there was considerable merit in the Rajiv-era argument that decentralisation would in fact reduce corruption in the long run,since it would be more visible as a leakage from commitments made at the local level.
The question then becomes: can we develop rules for coalition regimes?
The development of rule-based systems for a polity with an ever-expanding empowerment of groups and individuals becomes a challenge. Sometimes the quest itself degenerates into formalisms. The first rule has to be,of course,zero tolerance for corruption. Having said that,is the elite which includes all of us willing to share the largesse society provides to each one of us with an expanding political elite,legally? In my own experience,when I switched from academia to being a minister,my salary went down by around 40 per cent. Through the time I was an MP,our personal savings went down by a lot of money nearly Rs 80,000. By now MPs and ministers are paid better,but most of us are paid better too,and we resent any largesse to the political class. It is rubbish to think that they are inferior beings. But by doing so we force corruption even for those who may want to be honest.
There are other rules. In the second half of the 80s,Raja Chelliahs work showed that around two-thirds of industry was shifted from controls to fiscal and financial rule-based regulation. In the Bureau of Industrial Controls and Prices,I supervised this transition,with dual-pricing,tariff regulation and other financial rule-based policies. The transition was contested,but the courts upheld them,given the transparency with which it was done. In only two cases did a powerful corporate group scuttle the reform and it was postponed.
But when you have weak regulators retired bureaucrats,who tend to defend their earlier bailiwick and work in a non-transparent manner or,worse still,pass off everything
to a political process,an EGoM problems are invited in design. More rules for coalition regimes are needed. We need a positive debate. A nation on the move can ill afford procrastination.
The writer,a former Union minister,is chairman,Institute of Rural Management,Anand,express@expressindia.com
