Almost everybody - including those within the government and those outside - agrees that there is rampant corruption in the country.
There is even a general acceptance that only 10-12% of the funds allocated for the upliftment of the poor and downtrodden in this country reaches the targeted at the grass-root levels, rest of the entire amount is either gobbled by the corrupt or lost in the bureaucratic red tape.
Yet, it is surprising, the successive governments have done very little to device measures that ensure checks and controls, device measures that club responsibility and accountability when earmarking funds for any project.
Way back in the 80s, the then Prime Minister of India Rajiv Gandhi had publicly accepted this. The country's media recently when on record stating that lakhs of crores of Indian money is stashed in Swiss and other similar Banks.
I would certainly like to know, why then, each year the government is allocating crores and crores of rupees for development schemes in the far-flung rural regions without putting in place any mechanism that can ensure proper utilization of the funds.
Who is responsible for this great loss to the nation?
