THE ANATOMY OF CORRUPTION: EXERCISING THE PEOPLE’S RIGHT TO INFORMATION

BY ARVIND KEJRIWAL, Founding Member, Parivartan
2006 Magsaysay Awardee for Emergent Leadership
Presented at the 2006 Magsaysay Awardees’ Lecture Series
Magsaysay Center, Manila, 30 August 2006

Good Morning Ladies and Gentlemen!

Every citizen in India pays taxes. Even the beggar on the street pays taxes. When he buys a piece of soap or a matchbox, he pays sales tax, excise duty and so many other taxes. The governments run on these taxes. This money belongs to the people. The Government exists to serve them. We are the masters. But it is the duty of every master to take accounts from his servant at regular intervals. Did we do that in the last fifty years? No. Not because we did not want to do it but because there were no legal or administrative means through which we could do this. The Right to Information law provides that opportunity to the people to directly hold their governments accountable.

As early as in 1976, Supreme Court of India declared Right to Information as a part of our fundamental rights. It declared that Right to Information is inherent in Freedom of Speech and Expression, which is a fundamental right. The Supreme Court said that the people can’t speak or express themselves unless they had information. The Court further said that the people have this right because we live in a democracy, where people are the masters. The masters have a right to know how they are being governed. The Supreme Court further said that the people have a right to know how their money, collected as taxes, is being spent.

I would briefly take you through Parivartan’s experiences and evolution. Parivartan was started in January 2000 to address extortionist type of corruption, where a person has to pay a bribe to get his legitimate dues from the Government. The amount of money changing hands is much less in extortionist corruption. You may have to pay a few hundred rupees to get your telephone connection. But this corruption is much more dangerous. It affects every citizen. Every citizen is turning corrupt. So much so that the psyche of the entire nation has turned corrupt. People have started justifying corruption as a way of life. Any country where the entire population is corrupt cannot progress.

There was a deep sense of anguish inside us against the levels of corruption in Indian society. But we had no answers on how to address that. If we told people not to pay bribes, they would ask us, “How do we get our work done?” So, we started two departments. We started telling people, “Don’t pay bribes in Income Tax Department and DVB (electricity department). If you have any problems, come to us. We will get your work done free of cost.” Therefore, Parivartan was born as an ad hoc reaction to our sense of anguish.

For two years, we kept collecting people’s grievances in these two departments. We would then submit them collectively to the Department heads. This had an impact. All grievances which would go through us would get immediately resolved. We also started sitting at the entrance of some of the offices of electricity department and would encourage people not to pay bribes inside. This created flutter inside.

By accepting the grievances of public in this manner and intervening on their behalf, Parivartan started realizing that though this provided temporary relief to the people, it did not empower them in any manner. They became dependent on Parivartan for any problem. This was not sustainable. Parivartan was struggling with this dilemma when we read in the newspapers in December 2001 that Delhi Government had enacted a Right to Information Act. Therefore, Parivartan’s tryst with RTI was accidental.

We procured a copy of this Act and found that it gave five rights to a citizen – any citizen could ask any questions from the Government or seek any information; one could inspect any Government files or documents; one could take copies of any government documents; one could inspect any government work; and one could demand sample of material used in any government work. Under the law, an officer is supposed to provide information within 30 days of application or else, a penalty could be imposed on the guilty official at the rate of Rs 50 per day of delay up to a maximum of Rs 500 per application. If you do not get information or you were not satisfied with the information received, you could file an appeal.

We tried RTI for the first time in February 2002. There was this gentleman - Mr Ashok Gupta, who approached us with a grievance, that he was being demanded Rs 5000 bribe for a new electricity connection. Since he had been consistently refusing to pay the same, he was denied a connection for the last two years. Ordinarily, we would have accepted his grievance and pursued it ourselves. This time, we refused to accept his grievance. We drafted an RTI application for him and asked him to directly go and submit his application. He did that and within ten days some officials from electricity department came to his house with necessary papers for the new connection and told him, “ Here is your new connection. We are sorry for the delay. Can you please take back your RTI application now?” This was nothing short of magic. How did it happen? What did Ashok Gupta ask in his application? He asked:

• I made an application for a new electricity connection on such and such date. Please give me the daily progress made on my application so far i.e. when did my application reach the table of which officer, how many days did it stay on his table and what action did he take on my application in that time?

• Please give me the names and designations of the officials who were supposed to take action on my application and who did not do so?

• According to the rules, the connection should have been given within 30 days of my application. However, this rule has been violated in my case. Please tell me what action would be taken against these officials for violating this rule and by when.

• By when would I get my connection now?

In ordinary circumstances, such an application would be thrown into a dustbin. But this law says that they have to reply within 30 days. If they don’t do that, their salary would be deducted at the rate of Rs 50 per day of delay. And if they provide false information, again a penalty, up to a maximum of Rs 1,000 could be imposed on them. So, they have to provide correct and complete information within 30 days. Now, it is not easy to provide this information. The first question is – please provide daily progress made on my application. There is no progress made. But they can’t write it in that many words. They can’t write that they did not take any action on his application in the last two years. Otherwise, it would be an admission of guilt on paper. And no government servant would like to do that. The second question is – please tell me the names and designations of officers who were to take action on my application and who did not take action. The moment they provide these names, it is fixing of responsibility. Again, no officer wants any responsibility to be fixed against him. So, the moment you file such an application, they end up doing your job.

If this had happened only to Ashok Gupta, we would have thought that this was an exception. In Delhi Vidyut Board, we got almost 200 people file similar applications. They had various works pending for several months like faulty bills, pending electricity connection, replacement of meters etc. When they filed applications under the Right to Information Act asking similar questions, almost everyone’s work was done within a few days. We got similar applications filed by several people, who had work pending in many other Departments and their job was done within a few days. We used it in– water department, social welfare department, education department etc. Wherever anyone had any pending work in any Government department, which was his legitimate due and was being denied to him due to demand or expectation of a bribe, the work would be done in a few days as soon as one filed an application under RTI Act.

I would give you another example. Nannu is a daily wage earner. He makes his living by working as a laborer on road construction works. He lost his food card and applied for a duplicate card in January 2004. According to the rules, he should have been issued a duplicate card with 10 days of application. But for three months, he kept running around. None listened to him. Many times, he would not even be allowed to enter the government office as he has a very shabby appearance. Three months later, he came to our office seeking help. We told him about the Right to Information Act and made an application for him. He himself went and submitted the application. On the fifth day, an inspector came from the Food Department and told Nannu with folded hands, “Nannuji, your card is ready. Why don’t you come and collect your card?” When Nannu went to collect his card the next day, the Food and Supply Officer (FSO), who is the head of a Circle, escorted Nannu to his room, offered him tea, gave him his card and said, “Nannuji, this is your card. Now, why don’t you take back your application under the Right to Information Act?” The same Nannu, who was a persona non-grata till a few days back, suddenly became a VIP in the eyes of the very same officers.

Thereafter, Parivartan changed its strategy from accepting public grievances directly to educating them on how to use RTI to solve their own problems. So now, the people in India need not pay bribes for their legitimate work in any Government department. RTI often works faster than bribes. It does not make economic sense to pay bribes any more.

We also decided to expand the scope of our activities from just dealing with public grievances to demanding accountability from the Government on various accounts.

In a unique initiative, records related to 68 development works (like construction of roads, lanes and drains and installation of hand pumps etc) worth about Rs 14.2 million undertaken by Municipal Corporation of Delhi in two slums in East Delhi were obtained using RTI. These records were publicly discussed in a public hearing on 14th December 2002 attended by almost 1000 people including local residents of the area, journalists and eminent personalities. The contracts were publicly read out and local residents testified about the status of works. It was estimated that items/works for almost Rs 7 million were missing. For instance, out of 29 hand pumps paid for, only 15 had actually been installed. Out of 29 electric motors paid for, none had been installed. Many roads and streets existed only on paper. It acted as a model of how people can hold their municipalities accountable.

During this time, we were approached by several poor people that they were not getting proper rations. Government of India spends Rs 260 billion annually on food subsidy. Through its Public Distribution System, it attempts to provide subsidized grains to about 65 million families identified as living below poverty line through a chain of shops called ration shops. However, the leakages are so enormous that it has rendered the entire program meaningless. In February 2002, a very poor woman called Triveni approached us complaining that she had not received any food grains from the Government for the last several months. Triveni is a poor woman, who lives in a slum colony in East Delhi. She holds a food card issued by the government to the poorest of the poor. Triveni filed an application under the Right to Information Act asking for the quantity of ration issued to her as per records and also copies of cash memos purported to have been issued to her. After a month, she received a reply stating that she had been issued 25 Kgs of wheat @ Rs 2 per Kg and 10 Kgs of rice @ Rs 3 per Kg every month in the last three months. The cash memos showed thumb impressions having been made in her name. She is a literate woman. She never puts thumb but always signs. Naturally, the thumb impressions do not belong to her but are fakes. This shows that the shopkeeper had been drawing her ration by faking thumb impressions in her name for the last so many months. Triveni was shocked. But now she was equipped with evidence to proceed against the shopkeeper. Before she could take any action, the shopkeeper came to her house and pleaded with her not to take any action and that he would mend his ways in future. Since then, Triveni is getting right amount of ration at the right price for the three years.

Encouraged by Triveni’s example, we decided to do it on a large scale. Parivartan, along with a number of people living in slum areas in Delhi sought, and in some cases were successful in obtaining, records of ration shopkeepers in various parts of Delhi. When these records were physically verified, the findings were nothing less than shocking. Almost 93% of the food was being siphoned off by the shopkeepers by making false signatures of the cardholders in records. In most areas, the people had been given to believe that the government had stopped sending rations. People living in one slum area had not received even a single grain for the last so many years. But when the records came out, people were shocked to see how ration was, in fact, being siphoned off month after month by the shopkeeper.

Distribution records of shop owners, obtained in several areas in Delhi, were made public. This exposed the corruption being indulged in by these shop owners. In some areas, this was sufficient to force the shop owners to mend their ways. But wherever they did not still improve their conduct, formal complaints were made along with the evidence collected through Right to Information. In response, the Delhi Government cancelled shops in some areas.

The result of all these initiatives has been that in a number of slum areas in Delhi, almost all the families have started getting their full entitlements of rations, whereas earlier almost 90% of it was being diverted.

In this whole process, Parivartan workers were physically attacked by the ration shop owners several times. There have been six attacks so far. In some of the earlier attacks, Parivartan workers were beaten up and their records were burnt. But in December 2004, ration shop owners slit the throat of Santosh, who has been in the forefront in Sundernagari. But there has been an immense support from the public. After the attack on Santosh, a large number of families decided to forego their rations for the month of February as a mark of protest. The call for satyagraha was given by about 500 families, who had gathered to celebrate Republic Day. Ultimately, almost 5500 families did not take rations in February. This resulted in Delhi Government agreeing to a series of systemic changes in the PDS. Now, the records of all the shop owners are being thrown open for public inspection every month. This is a historic order. It is for the first time that the Government records are being thrown open regularly for public inspections in this manner.

Parivartan has also been encouraging individuals and other citizens’ associations like resident associations to use RTI in their own areas.

Uday is a software engineer. He lives in Vasant Kunj in New Delhi and works at HCL in NOIDA. Everyday, he takes the Ring Road opposite IIT Delhi. In February 2005, he noticed that the road between IIT flyover and Panchsheel flyover was constructed and it came off within 10 days. His blood boiled. He filed an application under RTI asking three questions:

• I want to inspect all the files and documents related to the construction of this road.

• I want to inspect this road

• I want to take sample of material used in the construction of this road. Please tell me when should I come?

He was given a date and time for inspection. In the meanwhile, he was approached by the concerned Junior Engineer and other officials, who requested him to withdraw his application, but he refused. When we went to inspect that road, the concerned Executive Engineer informed us that the whole stretch has been relaid two days before the inspection. We could take a look at it and if we pointed to any more discrepancies, they would also be addressed. This could be done because the payment had not been made to the contractor so far and the contractor could be forced to redo the work under the same contract.

These examples clearly show how RTI is redefining the relationship between the government and the people.

All corruption takes place in files. Often 100 meters of road is made but payment is made for 400 meters. Officials know that everything would remain buried in files. At best some one from vigilance or audit might come to inspect them and they would keep their mouths shut after taking their dues. But suppose, when the road is being made you file an application that you would like to inspect the road and all files related to its construction and that you should be called for inspection, whenever the road were complete, it would have a great impact. Now, the engineer would think twice before making fake entries. He does not know who you are, what is your background? He just knows that someone from the public would come and inspect the files and the work. He does not know what would you do with the information, would you make a complaint to the police, would you release it to the media? I am sure that when you go for inspection, you would not find any wrong entries. And if you also ask for sample of material, it would make a difference in the quality of material too.

And imagine if the citizens started filing applications for every government work that they saw, it would make a huge dent in corruption.

In one of the most unique cases of the use of RTI, about 9000 pages were obtained under RTI Act regarding a World Bank funded water privatization project in Delhi which revealed that it was severely flawed. It created public uproar and the Government put the project on hold.

RTI has not just helped the public. It has also strengthened the hands of honest officers. Some senior officers told me that now, they are able to say no to politicians who ask for illegal favors saying that they would be in trouble if someone obtained their files. Fear of transparency and public scrutiny has also reduced the number of people putting pressures on them. One senior officer told me how he resisted pressures from a political party to spend public money for their political activities. He was victimized to no end for his resistance. He wished if RTI had been there at that time, public disclosure of all his notings could have prevented his victimization.

As I said, theoretically, the people are the masters and the governments exist to serve them. However, in practice, the government officials behave like our masters and the public is made to plead before them. RTI is clearly redefining this relationship.

My talk should not give an impression that RTI is panacea for all ills. It is not. But certainly, this is one of the most concrete steps that has been taken after independence to strengthen democracy and to empower people. The balance of power was heavily tilted in favor of bureaucrats and politicians all these years. RTI tilts it in favor of the people.

Much more needs to be done in the sphere of governance. For instance, what happens after you expose corruption under RTI? You make complaints to various government authorities, but they do not take any action. This does not mean that we should not use RTI. In many cases, just filing an RTI often leads to improvements. And when you expose past mistakes, it certainly improves future. But we also need to work towards a system wherein the government is obliged to take action on the complaints filed by the people. Our study of various laws and systems reveals several critical deficiencies in anti-corruption laws and systems. We are working in that direction now.

Let my talk also not give an impression that RTI is some kind of a fight with the Government or its officials. It is an extremely powerful weapon in our hands. It casts an equally greater responsibility on the people to use this weapon with extreme care and responsibility. When you give ten rupees to your son and ask him to get something from the market, you ask him for accounts when he is back. You do not ask for accounts to find faults with him. You do that as a part of a process, as your duty, as a matter of routine. Similarly, we should ask for accounts from the Government and about its activities, not to find faults with them but as a process and as a part of our duty to engage in our democracy.

Lot of people ask me – is it possible to end corruption? My answer is “No”. We cannot dream of a world which would be free of all injustices and bribery. But we can certainly dream of a world in which every individual would be empowered to fight injustice. Right to Information empowers the most ordinary man.

In the end, I would like to say that Right to Information is about truth coming out in public domain. It is about transparency. It is about ethical governance. This cannot work one way. It has to work both ways. So, when you ask information from the Government and expect it to be transparent, ethical and truthful, let us introspect and ask ourselves – do we have the moral authority to demand transparency from others? Are we as transparent and truthful as we expect government officials to be? In many departments, when you go seeking information, you would face several questions from the officials about yourself. Though legally, the officials are not entitled to ask such questions and it would be easy for you to dismiss their questions legally, but it would certainly set you thinking and you would not be able to dismiss them for long. Right to Information Act has started the journey for a transparent and ethical governance. Can we increase its ambit and start a journey for an ethical society and try to be as truthful and transparent in our relationships with society?

I end with these thoughts and am extremely grateful to Ramon Magsaysay Foundation for giving me this opportunity to interact with you all.

Thank You.