Fifty Crores Bonanza

Come elections or ‘vote of confidence motion’, horse trading word gets momentum in political parlance. Now, Karnataka state is witnessing this melee.Both ruling and opposition parties are leveling horse trading charges against each other. If news report is to be believed, each MLA on sale is getting whooping 50 crores for cross over!

How come this word has come in to use in political field? In olden times, people used to carry huge amount of gold and diamonds on the back of a horse traversing miles and miles across the continent for trade & commerce purpose. So this word emerged wherever talks of trade arose. In politics it became a trade of MLAs and MPs. Now politics is no more a mission, it has become a trade where these so called people’s representatives are traded in plush resorts, sea side pools or in 5 star spas. These MLAs move in a group like (black) sheep and cattle.

Have you ever wondered how these 50 crores are traded? I have absolutely no idea but I just wonder if these are carried in a jute sack or in a suit case? Where are the godowns from where the supply is made? There must be a distributing point. Then again, where do they keep all these money? I remember, several years back there was a CBI raid on a Government official’s bungalow and crores of rupees were unearthed from his bed rooms. They were shoved inside the pillows and mattresses. Family members used to sleep over it. What a luxury without getting a sound sleep!

Recently there was TV news that currency notes were found flowing in a river. During our time, we used to read in textbooks that once upon a time India was so rich that milk used to flow like a river. But not any more, now milk is a scarce commodity and scary too for the heart patents. What a progress from Milky River to Currency River!

Coming back to the question, where do they keep all the ill-gotten money? They can not keep in bank locker because the moment sack is brought to the bank, cat would be out. A deposit in benami name is also ruled out as furnishing of PAN number is insisted upon. Any investment in real estate above 30 lacs requires reporting to IT officials. Yes, Gold can be one option despite soaring price. Gold bricks can easily be hidden any where even beneath the ground without any possibility of damage or erosion to the gold.

Sometimes I envy those ‘not so educated politicians’ whose sharp mind are able to find ways and means to amaze and hide in such a way that sometimes even the professionally trained investigating agencies are not able to detect any thing whereas ‘we the educated class’ can not even think of a place to hide our hard earned few thousands of rupees in our house which often gets robbed by white collared robbers or gets stolen by miscreants.

The Police Story

Can you ever imagine criminals and murderers bringing a drunken cop to police station? According to a news report, this happened in U.P. Two under trials lodged in Moradabad district jail facing charges of robbery and murder were brought to Bijnore for court hearing but found the court to be closed on account of Krishna Janmashthami festival. To enjoy the festival, the cops escorting the criminals decided to have booze. They asked the criminals to wait at a bus stand and went inside the liquor shop. Later finding the cops too drunk, the under trials escorted the cops to the nearest police station instead of running away! This is a strange case of bad boys turning good Samaritans while the cops showing how much irresponsible and careless they can be in discharging their duties. Is it not puzzling as to why these criminals were taken to court on a holiday and how the cops left them at the bus stand without any escort?

In an another incident, this too in U.P., a young IPS officer, additional Superintendent of Police in charge of traffic was assaulted and dragged in a car for almost a kilometer while chasing three police constables fleeing in a car. These police constables were caught red handed by her demanding bribes from lorry drivers on a roads intersection. Even though both the incidents happened in U.P., the modus operandi of the police are same every where from Kashmir to Kanyakumari.

Recently the Karnataka police has released a report by the Public affairs committee of Bangalore according to which ‘38% of policemen believe that corruptions part of the system and that honesty does not pay all the time. 64% police agreed that greed is the root cause of corruption’. This may be true to some extent because of the general perception that the ‘moolah’ so collected from the lower rank constable is shared up to the top level. But does it not mean that corruption is not on account of low salary or living condition but because of greed? Never the less, both the above cases bring the police force in a bad light. If there is one up right police like the one lady S. P., there are three others who are all ready to pull them down.

It is very rare that a positive story about police activity is ever flashed by the media. Even our films shown them in a bad light acting like a ‘buffoon’ or hand in glove with the criminals and smugglers (films like ‘Ardh Satya’ or ‘A Wednesday’ are exceptions). It is heartening to note that a NGO ‘Janaagraha’ from Bangalore has launched a website “I Paid a Bribe” to sensitize the public. www.ipaidabribe.com is a Janaagraha’s  unique initiative to tackle corruption by harnessing the collective energy of citizens. It can be hoped that this site will bring out more such cases of corruption in all fields of life and the ‘non corrupt’ higher officials take note of such cases to punish the guilty, corrupt and irresponsible people in their respective departments for a better and cleaner image in the society.

( Sorry for the inconvenience as the comments button is not functioning for this particular post. You may mail me your opinion at my email Id-  srayyangar@gmail.com)