Corporate corruption by janataswamyoncorruption
(In Dalal Media (NDTV Deceit 24/7, IBN Lies Live) you dont get to see the real deal. The above audio that covers corruption in general and corporate corruption in particular has important ramifications for all Indians. Corrupt Media mafia would not cover it.
Janata Party President and Harvard University Professor on Economics, Shri Subramanian Swamy addresses an Indian audience on widespread corruption. His lecture was also followed by interactive Question and Answer Session. The quality of question and answers are far superior to the pantomime charades, using carefully selected audience, carried out by the sicko agenda peddlers – NDTV, Barkha Dutt etc in megalomaniacal ‘we the people’, IBN, sagarika ghose ‘face the nation etc’. Sicko Media of course fools around and provides hyper cum sanitized coverage on primed audience adulating CON party’s Rahul Gand and censors what Indians really think of him.
Dr. Swamy has been organizing such meets across India. Unfortunately Indian Media which itself is known for its low ethical standards hardly provides commensurate coverage. Dr. Swamy makes Important points. Those that care for India should listen.
Transcript capturing key points in the audio file follow. Thankful to tweeple @harikatha for helping with this. Listening to the audio is a good idea as it better represents the emotions)
TRANSCRIPT
There is an Epidemic of Corruption today. One has to get to the root of the matter and eliminate it there. There was a time culture of this country was known by three beautiful words: Satyam, Shivam, Sundaram. In my recent book Corruption and Corporate Governance in India (amazon, Flipkart), I have said, these three words should be redefined as satyam, spectrum and scoundrels.
This lecture will be in 3 parts:
- Define what is meant by corruption – define it as per law on formal basis. Corruption’s effect and implications
- To what extent corporates are engaged in corruption and what they can do to stop it.
- Over all cure for the epidemic of corruption.
Definition is needed because people call, dowry, extortion, fraud etc. as corruption. Corruption under law is misuse of public office for private gain either for oneself or for one’s family or for one’s friends. Prevention of Corruption Act defines it that way. An individual cheating another individual is not corruption. Its pure crime.
Corruption happens when trust is placed on person to occupy public office and nation’s resources are on the person’s command and then the person misuses that position for gaining wealth. Prevention of Corruption Act is a criminal law. We can prosecute someone for corruption under criminal law. The Prevention of Corruption Act was first enacted in 1947 and then subsequently in 1988 when new act was brought. There are many things in it that empower Indians to fight corruption. I find that even judges do not know some of the clauses. For instance, when I went to file criminal complaint against A Raja in the specially designated court which is loosely called CBI court, I made a prayer that I be appointed as public prosecutor in this case as I cant trust CBI public prosectutor to perform his role and it will take for ever as they will elongate it. I can help take it to quick conclusion.
The Judge first said, how can I appoint you as public prosecutor as public prosector is an advocate appointed by the government. I pointed out to him that under Section 5 of prevention of corruption of act, anyone that files a corruption case is entitled to be appointed public prosecutor. Judge said “He had not heard of law and can you read it out to me and if there is any judgement in this regard”. I read it out to him and said that in 1984, there is a supreme court constitutional bench judgemen which says Speciality of Prevention of Corruption Act is that individuals can be appointed Public Prosectors. Finally he said my criminal complaint is valid but he also said that as a complainant I had some responsibilities and when that is over, he will consider appointing me as a public prosecutor and it will be known on 5 February. There is lot of panic in lot of circles because once I am appointed public prosecutor, CBI has to assist me and I will start prying about various things. If I am appointed public prosecutor, In the 2G matter, Raja’ll go to jail within four months. that is what is necessary today. Wide spread impression in the country is people are not sent to jail for corruption. Noone is prosecuted to finality. That mood has to change by one person being prosecuted and then sent to jail. (Editor: Events forced Kapil Sibal, Man Mohan Singh and even the fountainhead of Corruption, Sonia to put up a facade of fighting corruption after perpetrating enormous fraud on Indians. CON party is trying to make best of a bad situation. To hoodwink the supreme court, Raja was arrested. The key is successful prosecution, where commitment levels of CON party are rather weak if not absent)
There is a fundamental difference between how US conducts itself on corruption and how India conducts itself. US is not the most honest country in the world. According to Transparency international, US is about 20th. India is far down ~ 90th. Denmark is at the top of the list. There is one difference though. In US they do prosecute successfully and take it to end. Now in 2008 January, almost simultaneously two press conferences were held. One in New York. One in Hyderabad. In Hyderabad, Ramalina Raju said, I have committed a crime, I have fudged accounts – now imagine his fudging accounts, after price waterhouse & cooper gives a clean chit to Satyam and ironically, an Indian Professor for ‘Ethics in Corporate Accounting’ was an independent member of Board in Ramalinga Raju’s Satyam; I dont know with what face he can teach students now on the efficacy of his learning. Anyway, Ramalinga Raju said, I am guilty. Around the same time, Bernard Maddof in New York held a press conference and said I have cheated people of their pension funds through Ponzy scheme. He also confessed. In July 2008, six months later, he was sentenced to prison for 150 yrs. This was because there were many charges against him. And they were considered consecutively and that added to 150 years. Ramalinga Raju of course is still in air conditioned hospitals waiting for charge sheet to be filed. That is the difference between India and US. Both are Democractic countries.
People compare India with china and argue how fast it is. People get death sentence etc for corruption. In China people get death sentence only if they are against the government. If people are pro-government, they tend to get away with corruption. I wont consider china as a model. We should benchmark ourselves with other democratic countries and see what is the difference.
It is my belief, even if probablity of catching someone is small. Punish the corupt by the most drastic way possible. Then, it can be shown mathematically as I have done it in my book using the theory of probability that there will be an incentive for honesty (fear of punishment as a deterrent) . Even if the probability of getting caught is low if the punishment is high – corruption will go down. There in lies the cure and I will talk about it towards end on how to do it. Important thing is that there is a criminal law in India that if individuals read and understand it, anyone can be caught. Anyone can go to court and file a case. You must have the stomach to fight it if you are threatened as happened to sonewala or to these RTI people; risks are there. If too many people stand up, there is nothing corrupt can do. That is why I say there shud be a mass upsurge for this. People should educate themselves.
Supreme Court in 1997, propounded Doctrine of Public Trust – That is betraying public, after having won the trust; they give the example of Satish Sharma handing petrol pumps to a favored few, SC cancelled all of them. I am using that to ask that all 2G licenses be cancelled. Today, I noticed that Kapil is thinking of cancelling. Before we cancel his appointment he is going to cancel licenses. He got such a rebuke last time, he apears a bit chastened. If law of judgements are understood by reading public, middle class, it empowers individual to fight corruptin. People can take on anyone.
I have done this for a long time. Ramakrishna Hegde was portrayed as an angel because he was talking of value based politics. I found out that he had taken land around Bengaluru, given to his son-in-law. I filed a case at him. I also found out that he was tapping phones including that of his girl friends to find out who they were going along with. That ended RK Hegde career. At that time many were critical as both of us were in janata party and I was doing this to my own party.
Later on I got sanction to prosecute J Jayalalithaa. I was able to send her to jail on custodial interrorgaton basis. By then Muthuvelu Karnunanidhi came to power. He was more corrupt than her. He took all cases away from me by passing a legislation in assemby where-in all cases where Tamil Nadu Govt had 1st fled an FIR, prosection will be done by Government public prosecutor and he backdated FIRs to predate my complaint. Those cases are still going on. Some of them got transferred to Karnataka. One of the cases is reaching judgement stage. There is a danger to J Jayalalithaa there. But then we had to fight Karunanidhi in election. J Jayalalithaa came to meet me and said “You may not like me, but we can fight karunanidhi together”. I said, “I will not withdraw the case”. She agreed to it. Then there was a huge propaganda that till yesterday you were prosecuting her, today you have joined her. It becomes difficult to be a purist in this environment. I have to do guerrilla warfare. Sometimes I have to make these adjustments. On the fundamental issue though, I think there is no compromise possible for corruption.
Chanakya had written on corruption. He said there are forty ways to do corruption. Today there are 40,000 ways of doing it. No of ways, ramifications are very very large. Incentive to do corruption is when people want stuff they are not entitled to on merit. Therefore corrupt fellows bribe people that do the allocation and change merit. It ruins the entire society. When u get something that you dont deserve on merit, the decision leads to sub-optimisation. Tender for building a road is allocated to someone that builds a road through inferior material. Road gets washed away in one monsoon. So society ends up sub-optimising decision making. (Editor. Corollary is that reservation is a sub-optimization solution too. Bloggers like @realitycheckind that write on Social Justice may want to comment)
Secondly, in the process, when people start engaging in corruption, money that comes in tend to be black money. People can invest black money but there is a risk of getting caught. So what do ppl do; they spend on luxury goods, they air condition each room in their home, they buy Mercedes, they go to 5 star hotels for dinner and lunches. In the process corruption distorts investment priority. Businessmen would fund those industries where rate of return on investment go up through corruption. If corruption continues, in the future, businessmen will leave producing those that are essential…clothes, housing…for common man. They move towards high end returns enabled by corruption. So corruption alters priorities. (Editor: Corruption also enables hoarding. Corruption money also subverts both electoral and political process)
When one makes lot of black money, they have to put it in Swiss Banks. Now not so much in Switzerland. But in Cayman Islands, Macau in China, because they are seen as more trust-worthy. When this money is put in secret accounts, they dont attract interest returns. In fact it attracts service charge. So Indian politicians were thinking how to make the money on the money that they have made. If they were to pay sevice charge, it reduces the amount they have deposited. So they changed policy by which they can make money on corrupt money. Mr Chidambaram as Finance Minister got a Financial Derivative called Participatory Note. No where in the world there is something called a participatory note.
What is a participatory note? You have cash abroad. Or if you have ruppees, take it to a hawala man, he will give u dollars abroad. You take the cash, go to the counter of Morgan and Stanley or Fidelity Investments and say you need a participatory note. He will give you a piece of paper with amount written with nothing else writen on it. Then you go to Mauratius and create a 1$ company. This is thanks to Yashwant Sinha as FM, who had declared that any trading done by companies based out of Mauratius will not be subject to capital gains tax. So you dont have to declare sources of money. SEBI was exempted from surveillance of participatory notes. Short Term Money in stock market has grown up by leaps and bounds in the last 4-5 yrs. The money can come in any time, go out any time. That is also part of law in India now. Participatory Note can be converted back any time. Go to RBI, give the Participatory Note, take the money. Go and buy stocks. Stocks zoom up. Sell the stocks, get the money in dollars and take them out. This is why stock markets oscillate. Indian stock market hs become rigged because of corruption. (Editor: Tweeple @suchetadalal has extensively covered this in moneylife.in )
Now there is another important angle. National Security: This pertains to 2G spectrum. Two real estate companies – Swan Telecom and Unitech, were favored by A Raja. They were not telecom companies. They had no telecom experience. They were pure real estate companies. These two companies after getting licenses at ridiculous prices of 2001, went out and sold it to two foreign companies – one is called Etisalat and other is called Telenor. In India Etisalat is now called Etisalat-DB (DB is short for dynamics balwas) and Telenor is called Uninor (unitech+telenor). Now that is interesting is they sold licenses to these two companies at 8 times price they paid to govt. When Kapil sibal said there is no loss at all, how come they are able to sell at 8 times the price they paid. Multiply 2001 prices by 8. 14000 cr * 8 = 112000 Cr. CAG added loss accrued on CDMA, Wimax etc and the loss added up to over Rs. 172,000 Cr.
I was in TN village. Villager asked me can you tell me how many zeros are there in 2G scam. I told 11 zeros. People have become excited about this. Many people have asked me what is this 1G, 2G…Someone asked Manmohan Singh what is 2G. He said..Yes, Sonia G and Rahul G. But 2G has got to do with number of cycles per second. When I use a cordless phone land line the wave is long. No of cycles is more in 2G. You can send more information. Similarly 3G, 4G number of cycles are even more. That is physics. G is generation.
During the spectrum sales process, Home Ministry kept quiet. Home Ministry in another context had written a letter to Finance ministry and to RBI that as far as Etisalat and Telenor are concerned they are undesierable from national security point of view. Why? Home Ministry said, Etisalat is controlled by ISI of Pakistan. I checked Etisalat website and they themselves acknowledge that 27% of Etisalat is controlled by Government of Pakistan. Home Minstry goes one step further and says that one of the Etisalat directors is a close associate of Dawood Ibrahim.
Telenor buys equipment from the Chinese People Liberation Army. Telenor has developed a software by which anyone that uses Telenor SIM card can be tracked any time, any where. PM may not carry this phone. His PAs, his peons, his drivers, end up carrying Telenor. Then if necessary they can be tracked by Telenor. They are going to put up towers.These towers can hear other people”s conversations. Now, in US, they dont allow foreign companies to do all this. Their country is supposed to be a free capitalist country. This is because National security is involved. Here it has been sacrificed because of the money that has been made. I am saying that corruption completely undermines values to the point where even national interests are sacrifiecd. That is why it is dangerous.
I dont need to tell u about Corporates (corporate corruption). I can tell u one story abut how a corporate came up through corruption. In 2001, I was invited by (New York Stock Exchange) NYSE Board to give lecture on corporate governance. I spoke about disclosure norms of Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). These came up because of Enron. Enron had parallel accounting. That means they showed profits that did not exist and the stock went up. One day, enron could not make debt payment; the fudging had gone far. Then there were new SEC disclosure norms. I pointed out to them and said if these norms are applied, most of the top companies in India will become disqualified.
I pointed out about a company that had put a Rs. 3000 Cr IPO to build a Petrochemical Complex in Gujarat. After it got Rs. 3000 cr, it wrote to Govt, saying there is going to be a delay and the company should be allowed to give the money as inter-corporate loans to other companies. Govt gave permission. The company had tremendous influence. I tracked that. I noticed that 253 companies got inter-corporate loans. I got someone to do research with Registrar of Companies. All the 253 companies had the same chairman, same directors and same address also. And therefore I went to the address. I found one small locked room in Maker bhavan with no furniture in it. Now What did these companies do after getting the intercorporate loans? They went back and purchased the stock of the company that gave them loan in the 1st place! And this clever person took another loan from bank by hypothecating the inflated value of the stock. I will call this as more than corruption. I will call this fraud. When I told this to NYSE board, the board members started giggling and one of them asked if I brought this to the attention of authorities. I told him that I have filed a case in the Delhi high court. HC has issued notice. There after High Court sent it to Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Company Law Board to give a status report. That was in 2001. Company Law Board is yet to give a status report. I am in no hurry. One of these days, when I have spare time, I will go back to Delhi High Court and start making ruckus. Right now bigger things are going on. Then the board asked me if I can send details. I sent them that. At that time 12 companies had applied to be listed in NYSE. Company I mentioned ceased to qualify. Remaining 11 qualified and one of them was Satyam. At that time, I did not think Satyam would do all this. I thought, Satyam would mean Satyam..it was not so!
Mr. Holla says corporates should reduce 50% bribe amount that they pay to get work done. I would ask corporates to flatly say, no bribes. But it should be a collective effort. If u wont pay and if another fellow says he would then get the contract. You all know who is corrupt and who is asking how much.You shoud inform this. Spread the news.
40% of Indian GDP is in foreign hands. Its not difficult to get the money back. But the current lot would not do it because many in power have accounts. Germans gave half a billion dollars to an employee of a Lichtenstein bank – said, give us all the secret accounts. About 300 accounts details were given to them. Many are Germans and they have been prosecuted. Germans then wrote to various countries – “We are ready to share it”. In 2008, I corresponded with Manmohan Singh. I asked the PM, what are you doing about it. After much prodding he acted; but he is refusing to release the names. Because one of his top minister’s son’s names is believed to be there in one of the accounts. One top industrialist’s name is also there in the account. This is only for a small country like Lichtenstein. Imagine what it will be for Switzerland.
One of my students at Harvard is in Switzerland. I still teach every year a semester in Summer. My student is holding a key position in a bank in Zurich. He told me that there is a law in Switzerland by which GoI can get all the information if they so want. GoI should issue an ordinance, if they want to get the details quickly. The ordinance should declare that all accounts by Indian passport holders in Switzerland are here by nationalized; and if any of those account holders prove to us that the money held in Switzerland is legitimate, we will de-nationalize that account. all others will be Govt property. Switzerland will be compelled to execute that as they cant have illegal accounts. PM of course cant do anything today.
You will ask me why did you save PM in the Supreme Court. I say, what is the use of making him resign. Another person will come. At least this person is spineless honest person. Next person will be corrupt spineless person. If the whole Govt goes out then there is no problem. But why him alone. Everyone is angry with MMS. Everyone knew about him. He did not come through elections. He is not even an MP. This much is said about him that he is a man of personal integrity. But personal integrity is not enough. Bhishmacharya had great personal integrity. But he watched Draupadi being stripped in front of everybody. Shri Krishna decided he deserves to die. But then when he died, the whole Kaurava camp went with him. If the whole UPA govt is going to be removed, I will be the first one to say, MMS led Govt for God’s sake should go.
Corruption should not be a party matter at all. Take some measures. Some of them short term. Some of them long term. Let me say some sectors were very corrupt and today are relatively honest. Railway reservation. In 1970s, it was hell to get train reservation. Rajiv Gandhi among the good things he did was bring in the computerization of railway reservation. Today by and large there is no corruption. So corruption was eliminated in Railways by eliminating discretion. Something like the spectrum, you cant have waves colliding. So spectrum like land is a scare resource. Whenever you have a scarce resource, auction is the way. Make that law; then scope for corruption gets reduced. 2G corruption took place because auction was avoided. Noone talks about corruption in 3G because 3G was auctioned. We got lakh of crores there.
We need to make an example of few people. Keep focusing. I am focussing today on Raja. After I am finished with Raja, I will go after the Rani (Sonia G) also. Because he got only 10% of total bribes. Total bribes were 35% of loss which is about Rs. 60,000 Crores. 10% of that is only Rs. 6,000 Cr. Its not big these days. Only 10 yrs ago, I have seen raja come on cycle. Other people got a bigger share. Who provided him patronage. Today A Raja is feeling let down. Today safest place for him is jail. If other people feel he can spill the beans he wont see the next day. He might get a mitai (sweet) which will make sure he does not see the next day. Thefore, I will say, we have to make an example. Take one case..forget IPL, forget commonwealth. One minster has to be punished.
Second thing is why is there so much corruption after liberalization. I am not sure. During permit license quota raj too there was much corruption. Numbers today are much larger. Our economy is also much larger today. One thing is corruption is an outcome of greed. Someone said it. With Greed there is no saturation. It is like putting Ghee on fire. So more money you make, you want to make further. Greed has come because of materialistic outlook we have developed. This is not sanatana dharma (India’s native tradition). All through Indian civilization of thousands of years, one thing was always stressed. Material growth is essential – but it has to be harmonized with spiritual values. That is why when 2 great Rishis, Brighu, Bharadwaj got together and decided to structure society, they set up a Varna system which got degenerated because it got connected with birth.
In the original varna system of Brghu, Bharadwaj it had nothing to do with birth. You can see it for yourself. Veda Vyasa who wrote Mahabharat was born to a fisherwoman. He was not a Brahmin. Valmiki was from most backward or dalit class. He was a Maharishi. Viswamitra who was Rshi of Rshis – his parents were Kshatriyas. Kalidasa, Kavi of Kavis was born to Hunters. Yes. Ravan was a brahmin.And he was killed by a Kshatriya. Rama. All the Brahmins worship Rama. they dont say, this man worshipped one of our own people. I explained this to Karunanidhi. He was all the time presenting Ravan as a dravidian god. He does not do it any more; As I brought out the Ramayana and showed him that Ravan was a Brahmin. Nowadays, he only attacks Rama. One day he attacked Ramasetu. How can u call it by that name. Was it built by Rama? Was he an engineer? Which college did he go to? Next few days he fell ill. He was admitted to a hospital with the name, Ramachandra Medical hospital. I wrote to him and sent a ‘Get well soon’ card and wrote when did Rama get MBBS?
In our system, Acharyas could be from any caste. But they had to have knowledge. They cud not have weapons. they could not have wealth. They had to beg for food. But the society held them in high esteem. The king, the Kshatriya, he had the weapons. He could not decide by himself, if he could go to war. He had to ask for permission from Brahmins. He could not mete out arbitrary punishments. We were not a monarchy in the western sense. Its wrong to call India a monarchy. Vaishyas could make money. But their social status was not proportional to the amount of money they had. Similarly Shudras – they had land; but they had to produce for society. Those pushed out by society, their children were not outcasted. That was the original system. Krishna says this in Gita – it has nothing to do with birth. It has to do with Gunas (inherent qualities).
Anyway today it is a discredited institution. We have to act as one people. And we are one people because, the DNA analysis now shows, that we are all one ppl. This dravidian/aryan divide is bumkum; no truth in it. Fundamentally we are one and a continuing society.
(Editor: Jati and Varna are systems that have been dynamic systems. These are distinct from what the westerners call caste. MN Srinivas has written on the enormous resilience of Jati, and its dynamic nature. Right leveraging of strengths of varna, jati paradigms and institutions for social good should be attempted rather than accentuate jati for manufacturing hate towards the ‘other’ as happens in current sickular polity. It is no coincidence that backers of corruption and sickular polity are one and the same. By dividing Indian people through divisive rhetoric, by condoning violence by certain groups, by encouraging identity politics and not aspirational politics, sickular politics nurture, hate and divisiveness for the benefit of sickular organisations.)
US is a rich country. Now you find that increasingly people take to Hinduism. Julia Roberts with her entire family converted to Hinduism. Now there is a book called American Veda. It says American peoople are fascinated by Hindu religion bcoz, there is no greed. There is no one view. You can believe in God; you can not believe in God. There are some fundamentals – that are rational (not dogmatic). Sri Sri Ravishankar ashram is full of foreigners. Swami Dayanand Saraswati Ashram is full of foreigners. When I go to Harvard to teach, people see my name Swamy and think I am a sadhu. People ask what can they do for mental peace and happiness. Unless material wealth is balanced with spiritual values, you are going to be an unhappy country. Pure materialistic approach is the reason for corruption. Long term solution to corruption is going back and bringing back values of simplicity, venerating people that give up everything. This globalisation…make more money, any short cut..that has to change in the long run.
I am 100% certain, India cant be called dead country in terms of emotions. whenever there is a crisis, this country has stood up. 1962, chinese honestly thought, one little blow, country will break into 20 pieaces. The Chinese leaders themselves told me this. They were surprised when the country rallied. Women sold gold bangles for national defence funds. 1977, who thought Indira Gandhi will be defeated. Entire nation rallied. When Indira Gandhi was assassinated in 1984, nation again was together. I am almost certain on corruption there is that kind of consensus. Country is ready for major change. So instead of spreading gloom that nothing is goin g to happen, which I think, Congress party people are doing, something must and will happen. This atmosphere of hope and optimism must be spread as foundation for attacking corruption.
Question and Answer (transcript summary courtesy tweeple @harikatha)
Q: Why not we arrange for state funded elections, to break the corrupt nexus between corporates and politicians.
A: State funding is not the solution. Voting the right candidate is the answer. Mrs. Gandhi distributed sacks of money in 1977 for her election in Rai Bareli and she lost miserably. In 1997, J Jayalalithaa lost in Bargur despite doles of gold ear-rings distributed inside a ladu. And she lost against a tea stall owner. Cynicism pervading the country is a reason for widespread corruption.
Q: Why don’t independents win elections?
A: First thing would be to mobilize support for such candidates but we seldom do that. There is no public participation unlike the US where there is good public participation during elections. People seem to think that every candidate has to be come to everyone’s home like a cabaret dancer. It’s a debilitating view to vote with the flow for a winning party. Political careers of honest candidates are destroyed. This attitude has to change. Political parties will put up good candidates if they know that they will win. Political parties will change by the market.
Q: Do you think, if we had adopted market economy instead of socialism we would have had less corruption and been more democratic? you have vehemently stood for market economy since 1969 onwards. You even wrote a book on that. Do you think corruption wuld have come down as it is more de-centralised and democratic compared to socialism which gives complete power to government and harassment to public or corporates where they depend on Government for everything.
A: 1947 there was a wave of enthusiasm. Lot of good people came to politics. Following the soviet model led to license raj, which led to corruption – selling of permits, quotas, licenses. If we had adopted market economy, not laissez faire as wished by our founding fathers, Gandhiji, Rajendra Prasad and Sardar Patel we would have been in a much better position. You see the comparison (market economy, soviet model). Take the examples of S.Korea versus N .Korea or W.Germany versus E.Germany, China/India of today and before. I once discussed this with EMS Namboodripad, Marxist Communist party head. In capitalist country there is only crisis. In Soviet Union there is no corruption, no inflation etc. After few years I met him and told him, now there is no soviet union also. It has broken to 16 countries! (Editor: Communists in India have a history of being bribed by foreign elements. That in various forms continues till date though many have become sophisticated and migrated to wear liberal/internationalist masks)
Q: Who can eradicate corruption?
A: Pls dont think of Bhagavad Gita Yada Yada Hi Dharmasya, Glanir Bhavati Bharata out of context. You are there. You elect good people. Change will come. Politicians think only way to win is by giving money and buy loyalty. That psycholgy in politicians can be changed only by people.
Q: When can we have 50 Subramanian Swamys?
A: Well cloning is possible. (More seriously) I remember someone asking Mahatma Gandhi what makes you different. He replied, ‘my courage’. And the American reporter went on “Can everyone become Mahatma Gandhi”? “Yes” replied Gandhi if ‘people can manifest the same courage, not being afraid of anything including of dying’.
Q: What are your opinion on Karnataka?
A: For a person who has seen happenings in Delhi, Yeddyurappas digressions look like small traffic offence.
Q: CBI is Congress Bureau of Investigation. It has to become an independent entity. Central Vigilance Commision, Lok Ayuktha should be independent. If these three are made independent and a bill is passed in parliament, it should be brought into execution.
A: They need to be made indepenedent with provisions for appointing an independent prosecutor like in US. Lok Ayuktha can only recommend action. It should have prosecution powers.
Q: On a weak judicial system in India. No actions from Arun Jaitley, Veerapa Moily to strengthen Judicial System.
A: Law should be a curriculum in India in schools. Women should be thought karate, men should be thought the law. People don’t believe in lawyers.
Q: Laws are complicated and bureaucracy adds to the same. System has become bad. We need a benevolent dictator.
A: There is no such thing as benevolent dictator just like there is no boiled ice-cream.
Q: People have lost faith in 3 pillars of democracy – exec, legis, judiciary. Judiciary also seems to be suspicious. How to get rid of it?
A: Don’t agree with that hypothesis. I have been receiving lot of material to fight corruption from nameless bureacrats who themselves cannot take on the system. Value system is surviving. It has to be bolstered. Public perception is resulting in Judicial actions. People like you have to create a positive view.
Q: Corruption in media….
A: Biggest expose of 2G by J Gopikrishnan of Pioneer. He is a simple person. He could have got 1000 crores from Raja. He laid foundation for us to go to court. Some of the prominent journalist people. Niira Radia has brought it out. Everyone in any line is not corrupt. I would say 75% politicians are non-corrupt, but they keep quiet for their party bosses fund their elections. Such Blanket association is hence wrong.
Q: what are your chances of being public prosecutor on 2G scam?
A: We ll know soon. I will be appearing in court on Feb 5th
Related:
- Sonia G, Kapil Sibal, CON Party, Big media – Their 2G loot cover up strategy
- Arun Shourie calling out Kapil Sibal, CON Party fraud on 2G scam investigations
