Manipur no more very corrupt

Free Thinker *

Some few days back I came across a news item about the most corrupt states in the country. I was pleasantly surprised when I could not find Manipur in the list of most corrupt states. According to the "India Corruption Survey 2019" conducted by Local Circles and Transparency International India the state of Rajasthan is the most corrupt state for the year 2019; where 78 percent respondent-citizens told the surveyor that they paid bribes.

This time Manipur is lagging far behind. We are not even in the top five whereas Bihar is second. Something is seriously wrong. Media people may kindly ascertain whether Manipur was covered in the survey or not.

The third most corrupt State is Utter Pradesh with 74 percent people telling the truth that they paid money as bribe. The coveted third position is shared with Jharkhand with the same score 74. The fourth position goes to Telangana with 67 percent – not a very bad performance at all.

As per the survey the second most corrupt state is 'the' Bihar with 75 percent respondents maintained they paid bribes to the concerned officials for expediting their work. One Prof was asked why he is using the article 'the' before Bihar ?

The Prof said "you never question why the article 'the' is used before USA , then why not for Bihar? He further added 'the Bihar', 'the Lalu', 'the Nitish' - everyone laughed. He had his own logic for this; he said Bihar is unique in many respects.

Manipuris and Biharis have a bonding; because they have many things in common and many contrasts too. Biharis are very hard working whereas Manipuris are too lazy.

Biharis are careful about their money Manipuris are careless about their spending.

Some similarities are - both Biharis and Manipuris love and respect power, authority, status, recognition etc. more than any other citizens in the country.

Both love fish though they learnt to eat such things from undivided Bengal. Both the people are crazy about politics; they will talk politics – national, international, regional, local and indulge in politicks.

Today the basic requirement for corruption is money. In the modern-day world without the involvement of money we can't be corrupt. Philosophers may talk about corruption in a broader sense which includes favoritism, nepotism, bias, reciprocity, (give&take), dishonesty etc. But we all know that bribe can be either in cash or kind – kind includes all (including a service rendered by a paid hooker).

For erudites the scope for corruption is boundless. In Mahabharat even Kunti Matta indulged in corrupt practices because she offered maximum food to Bhim though she might have reasons for doing so. Dronacharya was favoring Arjun amongst his pupils.

So, let us not complicate things and confuse the Transparency people. The fifth position is shared by Karnataka and Punjab with a score of 63 percent. Both States deserve better performance because they are prosperous states and people are relatively well-off and they can easily buy the services of the bureaucrats and officials even Ministers.

In the years to comes they will certainly improve their position. Kerala is a failure in the field of corruption – they score merely 10 percent. It is the least corrupt State – a poor communist State.

Tamil Nadu comes 6th in this survey; with 62 percent the performance is not bad. I love this State because they always try to maintain their unique identity in every sphere of life.

In many areas they are way ahead; their film industry is bigger than Bollywood. Their election expenditure is above many other States. Tamil sub- nationalism is mind boggling. Tamilians glorify their language and culture more than anyone else. Mradrasis are very proud people like 'the' Manipuris.

Next year we must work hard to get ourselves included in the first five; this is a question of our pride and identity. In the Eighties once BBC announced that we were the most corrupt state; that was a proud moment for all of us; the world started searching for Manipur.

Today we have no world-famous identity except Mary Kom. Few years back we had the credential of being the most Blockaded state in the world, now that too had gone. Even the Iron Lady had left us.

Our local brew which has the prospect of world-fame is still stuck with a Committee in the Assembly. Perhaps our political leadership lacks the will to do; believe me our native brew will bring name, fame and prosperity; commers will realize it later; we must give the direction.

The report says that there has been a reduction in bribery in the country by 10 percent in the last one year. I believe the reduction is much higher in Manipur. Because people don't have extra money for indulging in such extracurricular activities.

People are more concerned about their livelihood, children's tuition, marriage cakes etc; now-a-days they are not even eating onions; in fact, their financial position becomes worse when Salai left.

Once our people get the arrears for the Seventh Pay Commission, we will certainly bounce back in the top five. For the time being let the Government celebrate yelling "we are less corrupt now".