The sting of Cobrapost
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: December 14, 2013 -

Although the attribution, the origin and the exact wording is still doubtful, Winston Churchill, who was the Prime Minister of Britain from from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955 and whose opposition to granting independence to India from the British colonial rule was no secret to anyone, has been normally associated with the quote, "Whenever we leave India...Power will go to the hands of rascals, rogues, freebooters; all Indian leaders will be of low caliber & men of straw. They will have sweet tongues and silly hearts. They will fight amongst themselves for power & India will be lost in political squabbles. A day would come when even air and water would be taxed in India..."

Without going into a debate on whether he had actually said this or not when the Indian Independence Act was introduced in the British Parliament for discussion and approval in June 1947, this prophecy of the noted but controversial British statesman seems to have been proved beyond an iota of doubt from what we are seeing around today.

Even after 67 years of gaining independence, the gap between the haves and have-nots in India has only widen, infighting among the political parties has become the order of the day and corruption level among the elected representatives, regardless of their political affiliations, and Government officials spiralling out of the control.

It is unthinkable for a common man and woman to do anything without having connections.

This is the true face of the 'sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic and republic' called India today.

In such a backdrop, the exposure made by investigative news portal, Cobrapost, in its latest sting operation under the codenamed Falcon Claw where in 11 elected Members of Parliament (MPs) from five National parties namely Congress, BJP, JD-U, BSP and AIADMK were caught on camera demanding bribes not just for writing recommendation letters in favour of a 'fictitious' foreign company for securing the oil exploration and rigging rights in the Northeast region but also for also lobbying with the Union Ministry of Petroleum in this regard, has come as not much of a surprise.

Interestingly, in their craze for money, none of the exposed 'honourable' MPs bothered to check about the antecedents of the company but were busy hankering after the amount of the money they want for writing the recommendation letters from as low as Rs 50,000 to a mindboggling Rs 50 lakhs.

This shows that the minds of these elected public leaders have been completely blinded by power and perk and common people could expect nothing from them.

From the involvement of 11 MPs, both male and female, belonging to five different National parties with different ideologies, base and reach, one can only conclude that the latest sting from Cobrapost is the proverbial tip of the iceberg of the larger and stronger undercurrent of corruption that has already eaten into the very core of Indian society.

As expected, the exposed MPs have started going on denial mode and their parties started their 'dirty trick' of accusing each other for setting up the sting operation.

No wonder, a party like Aam Aadami Party (AAP), which was floated not even one year back with the mission of ''sweeping away" corruption has caught the fancy of the people and gain so much support in the recent election to Delhi Assembly.