The Times of India has initiated a novel concept called “Lead India” for selecting (or electing?) leaders for the country based on merit and proved achievements. The idea is laudable and the rationale behind it is noble and interesting. A few days ago Jug Suraya wrote some interesting thoughts on this topic in TOI. He says our problem is hardly lack of leaders in sufficient numbers! We have plenty of them but who will follow the leader. That is the crux of the matter. Each of us thinks of ourselves as leaders, and we are prepared to lead but who is to follow?

The problem is that we are averse to follow any rule. Each individual has his own set of rules to follow. We all agree that corruption is the most wide spread disease that is affecting the progress of our country. We have corruption in all walks of life. We condemn corruption in the morning and indulge in it for the rest of the day, either giving or taking bribes! We have a set of rules for others and another for ourselves!

Our lawmakers have enacted “Right to information bill”. One should think that it is a mockery of public intelligence! Why should a bill be enacted to give the public the right to information? Is it not an admission of the secrecy with which the officials conduct the business of the Government? If the activities of the Government are transparent as it should be, where is the need for the Right to information bill? Even after enacting the law the Government and the officials are doing their best to circumvent it by hook or by crook!

Experts have categorised corruption under two general heads: (a) Collusive corruption and (b) Coercive corruption.
Collusive corruption is one in which both the giver and the taker of the bribes or commissions (for example collusion between a contractor and a govt official) stand to gain and the loser is the exchequer. The corruption is not immediately seen or felt by the common man. Generally the common man is indifferent to this kind of corruption.
Coercive corruption is different. The common man is subjected to this kind of corruption in his daily life. The root of the problem lies in the rules that curtail the freedom of the individual. The hundreds and thousands of rules and regulations that control each and every activity of the Government is the cause for this corruption. The rules are made for the ostensible reason of fair conduct of the Government officials and for the benefit of the ordinary citizen. But these rules have become the cause for corruption.
The common citizen’s ignorance of the innumerable rules that come in the way of his freedom to do anything as he or she wishes combined with his propensity to avoid as many rules as possible, makes it a fertile ground for the law enforcer to demand and take bribes!
Many experts in the field of Government administration have been repeatedly advocating scrapping laws, which are irrelevant and retrograde. But who is to act?

Many find it profitable not to follow rules, because enforcing rules is not an easy task, either for government or for social organisations. For example, in our multi-storied apartment building one of the apartment owners stopped paying maintenance charges to the informal Association of the members. For close to eight years he did not pay and the Association could not do anything to recover the dues, except threatening to stop water supply etc and he would say that the Association has no legal rights to cut off his water supply and that he would get a stay order from the court! The law he would say was on his side! Seeing that this man was getting away with his threats at least six others started defaulting in paying the dues and the maintenance of the building suffered. As suggested by a lawyer we got our Association registered under the Society of Firms and sent legal notices to the defaulters and also got a caveat against any stay order from court against stoppage of water and other services. The defaulters soon came round for settlement with the Association, sensing that a prolonged legal battle would not benefit them. Since the Association was a registered body we were obliged to hold Annual General Body Meeting and submit a copy of the minutes to the Registrar of Societies, along with audited copy of financial statement and audit report. When our representative went to the Registrars office to submit the returns, the junior officer talked to him rudely and told him to come another day. On next visit he would point out some mistake and on the next visit he would ask something else. He would be making several visits without any result. And one day he would openly demand for money in order to accept our returns! For the last two years we resisted paying any bribe money and the officers changed the tactics. They said that the Association should give an affidavit. But an affidavit saying what? The officer would not say. All he said was that you ask the dealer (that is one of the touts walking the premises of the office) and soon it became evident that we must pay the bribe! It cost the Association nearly Rs.5000/- to make the officer accept our returns! That is coercive corruption. Who has the time to fight this petty official who probably is in league with others!
Coercive corruption also is well organised. Our complaints fall on deaf ears and one ends up paying bribes. The only way to reduce corruption is to reduce the procedures and rules to the minimum. For example, when you purchase a new apartment you would want the Electric bills to be made in your name. A simple request is not enough for this. You must go to a tout or agent named by the official, and pay a sum of money to get the work done! You buy a property but you cannot pay the taxes unless you pay a bribe! The official will find a hundred reasons for not accepting the payment!
Traffic in our city is chaotic. You see traffic policemen in groups of three or four in junctions making out receipts for the fines or collecting bribes for not booking for the offences committed by the citizens. If these traffic policemen take the trouble of enforcing the traffic rules by directing the traffic there would be no traffic offence committed. But they are busy collecting bribes! One day a couple of friends travelling in a car stopped at the signals waiting for the green light and he was on the front row, waiting. He saw a traffic policeman standing a little distance away scribbling furiously in his little book and his friend told him jokingly that he was sure the policeman was writing down his number. Sure as his friend said the policeman was writing down his car number, and a few days later he got a letter from the police department asking him to pay a fine of Rs.300/- for rash driving! I am sure the policeman could not have been able to write down the car registration number if he was driving rashly as stated in the letter. Obviously the policeman was only making up his quota of fines and he chose the easiest way and jotted down the number of a stationary car! That is the way they work and we are helpless in changing the system.
So ultimately it is not the quality of the leaders that matter but that of the followers!!

An NRI Indian wife who lived in the USA for many years was shocked to see that in India people are wasting so much water for washing kitchen utensils dishes etc. In America the dishwashers do the job using much less water. What a waste of water she crowed! Just think of the amount of water that could be saved if all the households used dishwashers! Probably there would never be any shortage of water even if the monsoons failed. What a thoughtless nation! I thought, add to this the wastage of water from washing clothes the old way! Washing machines certainly saves water! Think of the water that the Indians would save if they chose to use the toilet paper instead of washing the body parts! Till not long ago, in the west (particularly UK) same bathwater was used over and over by a number of people, which saved a lot of water and heat too!

But all these practices are unthinkable for the Indian. For the Indian, the food and cooking methods are such that dishwashers are of no use. Most Indian housewives take pride in the superb shine of their utensils. Lot of scrubbing and water goes in to the process. Washing machines are catching up in urban areas where housemaids are difficult to come by or too expensive! Most Indians soak their clothes in soap water, beat them thoroughly, squeeze, rinse, squeeze and starch before drying the clothes in sunlight. But with the usage of synthetic fabrics the process has undergone some change.

Toilet paper? No. One may wipe and wipe till the skin peels off but without washing, that yucky feeling will never go away. No amount of wiping will do any good! And think of the yellow-brown stains on under wares and sheets!! Some one should calculate the number of trees that would be saved if the wipers the world over stopped using toilet paper. Probably thousands of hectares of forests would be saved! But who cares. The wipers feel yucky to even think where all the hand of the washer goes for the washing job! Not to worry, a hand is reserved for that purpose!!

Bath is a ritual for the Indian. For most Keralites it is a twice-daily ritual. Bath in a temple pond is considered a purifying procedure though the water in the pond may look yucky and green! But no reusing of bathwater over and over in a bathtub! The green colour of water in the pond is due to the reflection of the greenery of the surroundings, water plants, algae etc. The water plants algae etc are useful for keeping the water clean as also fish and other water animals, which live in, and around the ponds.

Before modernity caught up with Malayalees, oil massage on body and head every morning was common practice for both men and women. Women and men would scrub their bodies with a special scrubber called “eenja” made from the fibres of the bark of a plant and the women would wash their hair with a home made shampoo called “thali” prepared from a mixture of some plant leaves. The sight of a young woman coming out of the bath exuding exotic fragrance and clad in nothing but wet towel called "Thorthu mundu" has fired the imagination of many a poet and writer!! These practices have now given way to more convenient and simple shower bath.

The boom in land prices has encouraged many Indians to dispose off their family land holdings and invest in more profitable ventures and also acquire modern luxuries of life. A friend belonging to North India was telling me how his grand father would not allow a piece of land in his village, measuring about an acre or so, to be sold because he wanted the plot to be retained for his morning ablutions!! He was used to defecating in the open fields all his life and did not want to change this practice in his old age. He feared he would die a painful death due to constipation!! The caress of cool morning breeze on the bottom is too precious an experience to be given up for the mordern Potty!

There is no thing like "slight pregnancy". Was it Confucius who said that? !! So is corruption, either one is corrupt or not corrupt but never slightly corrupt!
Recently the Municipal authorities in Bangalore went on a rampage, demolishing buildings, which had flouted norms laid down by the authorities. Soon there were protests against the demolitions because these were the houses of the very people who had in the first place made complaints about the illegal constructions in the localities! In the beginning there was mass support to these good intentioned Samaritans, but when many unsuspecting people lost their dwellings they realised that all is not well and going in the right direction. Though the complaint was against commercial houses being set up in the residential localities, the authorities went on demolishing buildings for all other kinds of violations of construction laws. The complainants became nervous and ran from pillar to post to save their houses. It seemed that the government was saying, “You sowed the seeds, now you can have the harvest!”
That is the problem. Most of us are unaware that we could be sent to jail if we make any complaint against the “Authorities” – that is the Government Establishment. One should know that the Government is none other than “we ourselves” and if one goes on complaining against oneself the consequences could be very dangerous. Now the people in Koramangala in Bangalore have learned their lesson the hard way.
Most people do not want to give bribes, lest they should get caught in some complicated web. So the difficult jobs are entrusted to experts who know how to get things done. One should not ask difficult questions to the expert, because his job is to get difficult jobs done by difficult people sitting in difficult positions. You just pay the fees, which the expert tells you, and forget the details. Don’t ever try to think that you have a right to know anything more than that. If you do, you could face the same situation that the Koramangala residents faced!
This can happen in any Indian city because buildings have been built without proper clearances from the authorities after bribing the officials. These officials can strike back any time they choose to because they have the power to do so.
Some one said that the best way to get rid of corruption is to legalise corruption! When you legalise corruption there will be competition among a number of officials to do your job and the price for doing your job will steadily fall! Allow the competition to grow and it will find its own level in the market place!! A good capitalistic idea!!
But who wants to get rid of corruption?

We had a problem in our street. The street in front of our Apartment building is very narrow and if cars are parked on one side of the street, the movement of cars up and down the street becomes very difficult. Very rarely you get the chance to drive down the small distance of two hundred meters without stopping in gaps and allowing the traffic from the opposite side to pass by! But one fine morning we found that cars were parked on both sides of the street! This was the result of the government’s sudden decision to stop paid parking on roads of Bangalore. It was merry hell. Till then the attendant who collected the parking charges used to regulate the parking of vehicles on the streets, and he was able enforce a certain discipline. But now he has gone and cars were parked on both sides of the street making it almost impossible to negotiate the length of two hundred meters outside our Apartment building. This state of affairs continued for many days and we were witness to several fisticuffs in front of our building every day. When the problem became really out of control few of us living in the Apartment approached the traffic dept and gave a written complaint and explained our woes to the head of the dept, who promised to look into the matter. Within less than a week a traffic policeman visited our building and talked to the building management. He said he could arrange to fix “No parking” signs on one side of the road and put on duty one constable to enforce the rules. The problem he said was that there is a great demand for these “No parking” sign-boards and probably he might be able to fix one near our building after 12 to 18 months. But, there is a way if there is a will, he said! We could buy these sign boards from the supplier directly for a nominal price of Rs.1200/- each which he could supply within 24 hours, and the policeman would go out of the way and arrange to fix them near our building to stop the menace of wrong parking on our street. He suggested that we pay for 4 sign- boards so that the traffic regulation would become very strict and effective. The building Management sat together and deliberated on the subject exhaustively and came to the conclusion that we must pay for at least two sign boards to stop the traffic menace. Within 24 hours of paying the asked amount of Rs.2400/- for two boards, the policeman was seen busying himself with fixing two boards on either side of our gate, about 100 ft. apart and for the first time after several weeks the residents of our building experienced some relief from the chaotic parking of cars outside our building! But good things do not last for long, it is said. Our happiness almost came to an end after about 3 months of ecstasy!! One cold night a traffic van fitted with towing crane etc, stopped by the side of our building, three hefty policemen got down armed with pick-axe and crowbars and started digging around one of the signposts and within minutes the it was removed and put into the van. Few good Samaritans living in our building protested, but the policemen were determined and brushed aside all objections, saying that only one sign post was necessary near our building, and their boss has ordered to remove the second one to be put elsewhere. The good Samaritans could not tell them that these posts were paid for. If they did they could have been arrested and put behind the bars for corrupting the police force! One of the good Samaritans murmured “This is the case of the fence eating the plants in the garden”!!