Political Commitment

7.1 Political Commitment

This elaborate and multi-layered apparatus to control corruption could
hardly make a dent on the situation because of lack of political commitment on
the part of political leadership in the states and at the center. It is more than clear
all these institutional arrangements to combat corruption can be useful only if
correctives come from the political class which is the final legislative and
executive authority in a parliamentary democracy. The waywardness of the
politicians can be curbed only from within, there is no agency which can
continuously impose probity from outside. Unless the politicians are made to
differentiate private conscience from public morality, and personal profit from
national interest, the ongoing unrestrained plunder of the exchequer cannot be
stopped. The case of Bihar during the past decade shows that all anti-corruption
instruments and strategies come to naught against a political leadership which

has a vested interest in continuing corruption. Similarly, the spate of criminal
cases in which a former Chief Minister of Tamilnadu, Jayalalitha, was herself
involved shows that during her tenure political and administrative corruption
could not have been checked effectively primarily because of the political
patronage she had given to corrupt practices.