Our nation is facing a chaotic situation, chaos of corruption, poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, etc. We are ranked 127th both in terms of Human Development Index and per capita income. India is ranked 88th by the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) with a meager score of 2.9. The list of problems seems to be endless. We, the “bright future" of India are very happy about the GDP growth of around 9% as it is in some way serving the ultimate purpose of getting a good pay package at the end of our academic life. But the question that remains unanswered is that is this growth really helping in the development of our nation. The biggest foe of development is corruption as it’s affecting all the four pillars of our democracy namely the judiciary, the legislature, the executive and the press.
Someone who has got a rational thought process can ponder on this simple universal truth, the truth that power corrupts. We have often heard of the saying that knowledge is power. So we as students have been learning to study hard and be evil for all these years. Of course this is not explicitly stated anywhere but by the time we get to know why we are studying; this is the logic which initially defies our moral and ethical learning. Slowly we learn to live with such undemanding reality and our conscience fades because of the tempting power which we will soon have. As I said earlier that we are the “bright future“ of our beloved nation, so we need to find a way out to avoid these kinds of conflicting thoughts. For this we have to first analyze the authenticity of the above truth. It is said that power corrupts, but actually it's truer that power attracts the corruptible. Sensible people are usually attracted by other things than power. They are attracted by the responsibility which comes along with power. Power can never come without responsibility. By power I not only mean a position of authority or some post or some honor bestowed upon us. Power also includes the capability to read and write. This may not be considered power per se in countries like US and UK but in India where literacy rate is around 60% and even the inclusion criteria for so called literates is depressing it 's definitely a power. Education should give us the aptitude to ask questions, to make use of laws like Right to Information Act, Consumer Protection Act, etc. Education gives us the ability to question the existence of so many laws in our land which may perhaps be the largest in number in the world. Our Income Tax Act is surely the largest one in the world in terms of size but sadly not in terms of content. Tax evasion in India is breathtaking. The size of parallel economy is almost half the size of our GDP. There is a famous quotation "The more corrupt the state, the more laws.” I would like to add that the more complicated the law more corrupt are the people who understand it. That 's the reason why the list of most corrupt people include politicians, police, lawyers and professionals like Chartered Accountants (auditors), doctors etc. It does not shock Indians anymore to know that not only the ministers and IAS & IPS officers are corrupt but even the judges, professors, doctors and NGO organizations are also giving them good competition.
But corruption is not restricted to these strata of society. It’s trickling down to the bottom of the pyramid. Corruption is not only prevalent amongst rich who are greedy in spite of possessing enough but also amongst poor. I dare to say that up to a certain extent our education is also responsible for this. The way of transfer of knowledge in our nation is not taking into considerations the above stated simple yet inevitable facts. The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. We are thought to think like the western world but India is very different in all the aspects of life. We can use our grey matter in developing some India centric education system which lays emphasis on learning with earning to solve the problem of poverty and illiteracy. We need build India centric business model, which could be implemented with minimum capital, have scope for innovative ideas and serve as employment generator for the society. We are not here to accept the things as they are. We can’t be adorned by the golden words "bright future" if we are so dull that we only see what we want to see. We have to change the way we look at the world and we look our self. We have the power, what we need is desire to take the responsibility. To question what we do and then to question what people around us are doing.
Someone who has got a rational thought process can ponder on this simple universal truth, the truth that power corrupts. We have often heard of the saying that knowledge is power. So we as students have been learning to study hard and be evil for all these years. Of course this is not explicitly stated anywhere but by the time we get to know why we are studying; this is the logic which initially defies our moral and ethical learning. Slowly we learn to live with such undemanding reality and our conscience fades because of the tempting power which we will soon have. As I said earlier that we are the “bright future“ of our beloved nation, so we need to find a way out to avoid these kinds of conflicting thoughts. For this we have to first analyze the authenticity of the above truth. It is said that power corrupts, but actually it's truer that power attracts the corruptible. Sensible people are usually attracted by other things than power. They are attracted by the responsibility which comes along with power. Power can never come without responsibility. By power I not only mean a position of authority or some post or some honor bestowed upon us. Power also includes the capability to read and write. This may not be considered power per se in countries like US and UK but in India where literacy rate is around 60% and even the inclusion criteria for so called literates is depressing it 's definitely a power. Education should give us the aptitude to ask questions, to make use of laws like Right to Information Act, Consumer Protection Act, etc. Education gives us the ability to question the existence of so many laws in our land which may perhaps be the largest in number in the world. Our Income Tax Act is surely the largest one in the world in terms of size but sadly not in terms of content. Tax evasion in India is breathtaking. The size of parallel economy is almost half the size of our GDP. There is a famous quotation "The more corrupt the state, the more laws.” I would like to add that the more complicated the law more corrupt are the people who understand it. That 's the reason why the list of most corrupt people include politicians, police, lawyers and professionals like Chartered Accountants (auditors), doctors etc. It does not shock Indians anymore to know that not only the ministers and IAS & IPS officers are corrupt but even the judges, professors, doctors and NGO organizations are also giving them good competition.
But corruption is not restricted to these strata of society. It’s trickling down to the bottom of the pyramid. Corruption is not only prevalent amongst rich who are greedy in spite of possessing enough but also amongst poor. I dare to say that up to a certain extent our education is also responsible for this. The way of transfer of knowledge in our nation is not taking into considerations the above stated simple yet inevitable facts. The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. We are thought to think like the western world but India is very different in all the aspects of life. We can use our grey matter in developing some India centric education system which lays emphasis on learning with earning to solve the problem of poverty and illiteracy. We need build India centric business model, which could be implemented with minimum capital, have scope for innovative ideas and serve as employment generator for the society. We are not here to accept the things as they are. We can’t be adorned by the golden words "bright future" if we are so dull that we only see what we want to see. We have to change the way we look at the world and we look our self. We have the power, what we need is desire to take the responsibility. To question what we do and then to question what people around us are doing.
Written By: Vineet Patawari, IIM Indore
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