Corruption refers to the act of misuse and abuse of power especially by those in the government for personal gains either pecuniary or a favor. It promotes illegality, unethicality, subjectivity, inequity, injustice, waste, inefficiency and inconsistency in administrative conduct and behaviour.

Reason for corruption in India:

Political:

• Use of black money in elections: In the last 10 year the declared expenditure has increased by more than 400% for the LS elections with 69% of their income coming from unknown sources.
  
  
• Criminalization of politics: More than 30% of the legislators in the country have pending criminal cases against them.
  
  
• Crony capitalism: The economic reforms of 1991 has led to the growth of unholy nexus between Politicians and businessmen. 
  
  

 Economic:

• High inequalities: In India 1% of the rich hold about 60% of the total wealth. People at lower income levels are forced to pay bribes to officials even to get their basic needs fulfilled.
  
  
• High share of informal sector: In India more than 80% of the workforce is in the informal sector. Such enterprises usually bribe the officials to keep out of the ambit of laws where compliance is costly and complex.
  
  
• Low wages:The remuneration in the public sector remains below par with the private sector along with poor career growth opportunities and harsher working conditions.
  
  

Administrative:

• Politicization of bureaucracy: Example of honest officers being witch-hunted like Ashok Khemka and Amitabh Thakur are the indicators of the bigger malaise.
  
  
• Colonial bureaucracy: The bureaucracy essentially remains colonial in nature characterized by 19th century laws e.g. Police Act 1861, complex rules, wide discretion, secrecy, moral responsibility devoid of legal accountability and the ivory tower attitude.
  
  
• Judicial failure:The judiciary has failed to bring to book the corrupt officials including politicians.
  
  
• Failed reforms:Lack of political will and resistance from within the bureaucracy has led to failure of major reforms like citizen charter, RTI and e-governance.
  
  

Social and Ethical:

• Changes in lifestyle: Increasing shift towards individualization and materialism has led to increased penchant for a luxurious lifestyle.
  
  
• Social discrimination: The poor and marginalized due to their lack of awareness and high dependence on the state become the easy target of exploitation by corrupt officials
  
  
• Failure of education system: The value education has failed miserably in India to inculcate the value of empathy, compassion, integrity, equity etc. in the young generation.
  
  

Measures taken by the government to tackle corruption:

Legal Steps:

• Prevention of corruption Act 1988: Seeks to create a balance between the need to bring the corrupt to the books and protect honest officers. Its main thrust is to prohibit public servants from accepting or soliciting illegal gratification in the discharge of their official functions.
  
  
• Prevention of Money Laundering Act 2002: It seeks to prevent money laundering including laundering of property through corruption and provides for confiscation of such a property.
  
  
• Right to Information Act 2005: Makes disclosure of information a legal right of the public to promote transparency e.g. Vyapam scam of MP
  
  
• Lokpal and Lokayukta Act 2013: Appoints an independent authority Lokpal at center and Lokayukta at states to probe into the complaints of wrongdoing by the public servants.
  
  
• Whistleblower protection Act 2014: More than 60 RTI activists have been murdered and many more assaulted due to lack of protection.
  
  

Administrative reforms:

• E-governance initiatives: e-gov apart from advancing the good governance objectives of accountability and transparency also seeks to reduce the manual interface between state and citizen thus preventing the incidences of bribery
  
  
• Citizen Charters and Public Service delivery and Grievance Redress Acts in states: Many states like Karnataka (SAKLA initiative) and Rajasthan have enacted such acts to make bureaucracy legally accountable for delivering quality service within stipulated time periods. Bihar is the only state to have a Grievance Redress Act covering all departments
  
  

Economic Reforms:

• Liberalization and Privatization: License-Permit-Quota proved to be a highly potent tool in the hands of bureaucracy to misuse the power of their offices to amass illegal wealth. The LPG era proved to be a chink in the armor of bureaucratic discretion.
  
  

Despite these emerging trends, however, the institutional anti-corruption framework generally suffers from a lack of coordination, and overlapping and conflicting mandates between institutions addressing corruption. Therefore, there is a need for a mechanism that provides for simple, independent, speedy means of delivering justice by redressing the grievances of the people without succumbing to the clutches of the executive.