Wal-mart was at the centre of a debate in India last year: when the UPA government tried to open up the retail shopping to FDI. The numbers were not the government’s favour, so the matter was put on the backburner. But the proposal remains on the agenda of the ‘reformist’ policymakers and commentators. So, it would be worthwhile to take note of a bribery scandal the American company is facing in Mexico.

A New York Times investigation shows how Wal-mart has been allegedly taking the easy route of paying off officials to win markets. For an Indian reader, the exhaustive report (7,600 words) would raise just one question: in a country where the Rajas and Kalmadis are calling shots, what would this company have done? Or, to put it the other way round, was there anything more than what met the eye in last year’s debate?

Here’s the NYT story:

Vast Mexico Bribery Case Hushed Up by Wal-Mart After Top-Level Struggle
Confronted with evidence of widespread corruption in Mexico, top Wal-Mart executives focused more on damage control than on rooting out wrongdoing, an examination by The New York Times found.

MEXICO CITY — In September 2005, a senior Wal-Mart lawyer received an alarming e-mail from a former executive at the company’s largest foreign subsidiary, Wal-Mart de Mexico. In the e-mail and follow-up conversations, the former executive described how Wal-Mart de Mexico had orchestrated a campaign of bribery to win market dominance. In its rush to build stores, he said, the company had paid bribes to obtain permits in virtually every corner of the country. [More at the NYT website]