CORRUPTION GALORE
 

Sunil Dang continues with the story of an amazing Indian journal
 

In the June 1992 issue of the DayAfter, where the title of our cover story was "Questions for Manmohan Singh", we had focused on the crucial issues and dilemmas faced by the country, departure in the budget-making process under the finance ministership of Dr. Manmohan Singh and the colossal spread of corruption, which we feared would spread more in the years to come. I am afraid, notwithstanding which kind and colour of government came and went during the 13 years between then and now, corruption continued to spread and when out of power, those in the opposition began to suffer from colossal amnesia about their own exercise of absolute power, which is supposed to breed absolute corruption.

To go back to what I had written in June 1992, "No thanks to the Government but to the Fourth Estate, which has meticulously and diligently unearthed one scam after another, we are today aware that we have reached the lowest depths of corruption in the country. We have cases where the security forces high-up (on the borders) themselves are involved in pocketing the gold confiscated from smugglers. We adopt gimmicks for the gullible common people by claiming to reduce our Government expenditures. But we have cases where Government planes are used by ministers for attending party meetings. We have cases where the government planes are put at the disposal of the lawyers defending our ministers in their personal scandals. We have cases where the state government planes are blatantly misused for flying to state capitals from New Delhi to bring the night clothes of the Chief Minister. So much more instances that effect economy. We have bank frauds. You name any economic misdemeanour and our ministers have done it. In which other country of the world could a Railway Platform No. 4 and a Gandhi Maidan in a city have been accepted as collateral security for a bank loan? Harshad Mehta scam of that magnitude could never have happened if the Government had learnt its lessons from the similar Mundhra scam two decades back. One vital question eluded answer. Could such things happen without the Government’s connivance? One strong rumour doing the rounds of the Fourth Estate is that some high-ups, including ministers, are behind this scam."

Our slate included "Questions for Manmohan Singh," "Rao Slipping?", "Gems of Biju", "Star War in Delhi", "Indian Coasts on Hire", "Afghanistan Cracking Up", "What on Earth is going on?" "At the Mercy of the Banks", "Liberalisation: Death Knell," and "India’s top Women ‘Nude’ Painters". Every page brought out inside information and raised cutting questions. We always believed that truth is more powerful than all the powerful lies, told by powerful people and their propagandists and minions. We still persist in the motto that fishing out the truth is our sacred duty, for it empowers the people to know and to know is to be stronger to stand up against public enemies who are always protected by immense wealth, power and corruption squads.