Letters: Corruption menace

It is fashionable to dismiss corruption as something that concerns only those in developed countries. The argument goes that, in countries like India, corruption is actually a good thing since it helps businessmen get their work done faster and at a lower cost as compared to a situation where they would have to deal with a time-consuming official machinery. This is true, but only in a limited manner.

The problem, however, is there is another side to corruption. This is the side that ensures a policeman takes a bribe to turn his face when RDX is smuggled into the country; this is the side that allows companies to not pay the government thousands of crore that would have gone to create and nurture a good health and education system. Being the fourth-worst in the world in terms of bribing, as the latest Transparency International survey shows, can’t be a good thing.

Ashish Dayal, New Delhi