Finally, the government seems to want to listen to YOUR ideas on how we must work towards a corruption-free India. The Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) has published a public notice in newspapers today, inviting the citizens to respond to its 'draft national anti-corruption strategy'.

"The CVC invites public response on the draft strategy. Based on the feedback obtained, the commission would then recommend the final strategy to the government," says the notice.
The citizens have been requested to send their responses by September 20th, 2010, to the following address: K. Subramaniam, OSD to CVC, Central Vigilance Commission, Satarkta Bhawan, INA, New Delhi 110023; phone: (011) 24651085; email: [email protected]

First of all, this solicitation of public opinion on how we must fight corruption must be welcomed wholeheartedly and every citizen who feels the need to rescue Indian society from the scourge of corruption must find time to compose their thoughts and make their contribution to the formulation of an anti-corruption strategy.

This may well be really “your chance,” as the CVC notice says. Governance Now encourages all its readers to make the effort of sending well thought out and lucidly written suggestions to the CVC. The draft national anti-corruption strategy can be read on http://www.cvc.gov.in/nacs26082010.htm

Having expressed its support for the CVC’s effort, Governance Now considers it equally important to express some of the reservations that are borne out of the wholly justified public mistrust of the governmental efforts to fight corruption.

Our reservations are: (a) Will formulation of a mere ‘strategy’ initiated by a public body that’s hardly perceived as having been successful in fighting corruption suffice? Given the pervasiveness of corruption, don’t we need this initiative from the highest echelons of the government, perhaps the prime minister himself?
 

(b) The CVC has not said anything on how the views of the citizens will be assessed and incorporated or not incorporated into the strategy that it will recommend to the government.
 

(c) How will the national strategy be treated by the political executive, which is itself deeply involved in a lot of sleaze, as has been pointed out by the draft strategy in its recommendations to fight corruption in political parties and misuse of electoral funding (‘’Strategy to tackle grand corruption”).

The following are some of the points that Governance Now would like its readers on bear in mind while making suggestions to the CVC.

1. The common citizens of India are the best regulator of the behaviour of public officials and institutions. Social control can best be established through greater amount of publicly available information. The more information is available in public domain, lesser are the chances that corruption will be hidden from the public eye. Any mechanism that puts information in public domain must be promoted and strengthened. RTI has already shown us the way. The government must be pushed towards accepting all its obligations under RTI law. The citizens and the media must make greater and more organized effort to share and disseminate information.

2. Before we even consider new institutional arrangements, we must show faith in the already existing Constitutional arrangement of accountability, such as parliamentary/legislative committees and Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). The oversight of the parliamentary/legislative committee must be strengthened, such as by the power to summon people and public broadcast of the hearings of these committees. It may also be worthwhile to see how the CAG’s audit and social audit can supplement, complement and strengthen each other.

3. The citizens must introspect. It’s important to realize that corruption is no longer synonymous with ‘governmental corruption’, it’s a social phenomenon. Citizens are as much responsible for it as those holding public offices. The citizens must accept their Constitutional and statutory obligations if they want the public officials to accept theirs.