Every once in while, as happened to me just the other day, I get caught by the police while driving my motorcycle without a helmet. This has happened to me about four or five times during my stay in India and the process usually goes something like this: after asking for my documents (license, insurance, registration), the cop points out the blatantly obvious fact that I have broken several laws. (In my defense, complying completely with the driving laws of India is no easy task. I have gone through the pain-staking process of acquiring an Indian driving license -- four trips to the RTO and about 8 hours of waiting -- but there is no way that I am going to even attempt the gargantuan process of switching the registration of my motorcycle from Mumbai to Chennai.) The cop then tells me above-the-table fine for committing these crimes, which is typically some ridiculous number like 2000 rs. After a bit of haggling I am let off the hook for a small fraction of this number.
Perhaps I am being overly accommodating, but I never get upset when this happens. In fact, this process of extorting helmet-less drivers actually seems to me a quite reasonable way of supplementing what are probably very low wages on the part of the cops. Drivers can easily avoid getting pulled over by simply wearing a helmet, so in a sense, it is merely a tax on the lazy and reckless.
Of course, in an ideal world, the cops would be paid a reasonable salary and Indian drivers wouldn’t stand for this, or any, type of corruption. Given the current situation, extorting money from the helmet-less seems like the best alternative.
9 comments:
"this process of extorting helmet-less drivers actually seems to me a quite reasonable way of supplementing what are probably very low wages on the part of the cops."
I hope you're joking. Because by the same logic, you're saying that a partner who's not happy with his / her marriage is completely justified in committing adultery.
The answer is, of course not. Corruption can never be acceptable as a second best solution.
The solution, of course, is working on the marriage. Changing the system to ensure that the cops are rewarded for the work they put in.
Makes me think that we would go to any length to justify our wrong doing. Bias has a way of screwing up our perspective.
lol. yeah, i guess you're right. funny how your perspective gradually shifts right out from under you while you don't even notice it. thanks for the reality check.
on a positive note, i became even more inured to corruption when i lived in china.
=) It does... always watch out for bias during decision making.
Check out http://www.cmi.no/publications/file/?3032=pay-for-honesty-lessons-on-wages-and-corruption
The report finds that "Theft, graft, absenteeism and soliciting bribes in the health sector in developing countries
is often blamed on low pay. But does low pay actually explain corruption? Several studies of
public hospitals in Latin America suggest otherwise. In particular, they show that low pay may
contribute to corruption; however, without some form of monitoring to detect corruption and
a real chance of penalties, raising wages is not likely to make a difference."
There is yet another perspective though that is worth considering. If you don't think in terms of right or wrong but simply think of everything in terms of allocational choices with the government as merely one of the actors and the "rent-seeker" as another, which one produces better allocations in economies where the government may use allocational basis that are sub-optimal -- would the "rent-seeker" choose more more optimal allocation? The example of helmets may not be very useful here but for examples in which awarding of contracts / licences is at stake, I wonder which approach would produce better answers?
A number of Indian businessmen for example would argue that "black money" actually produced a much more efficient allocation of resources in the Indian economy at a time when the government was trying to distort the economy using some very old-fashioned central planning approaches (the famous "License and Permit Raj").
Also check out the world bank blog entry on this subject: http://psdblog.worldbank.org/psdblog/2007/08/corruption-in-i.html
I dnt know, if it required all this. Doug probably wearing a helmet is much easy than writing all this ...:)
And you know, wear a helmet. There are very little chances that traffic Police will stop you for license and papers.
Well, per the corruption debate, it shows we take corruption as an option/choice among all the things we can do. I am afraid its not like this. Corruption is a malpractice.
The hidden cost of this apparently innocuous looking form of corruption is what the country pays in terms of the tragic loss of life and property on city roads and highways every year.
When minor traffic rules start getting broken and people get away by paying bribes it doesnt take long before every rule in the traffic rule book has a price tag attached to it. And after the traffic rule book its the turn of the Indian penal code to be subjected to this price tag exercise.
Lets not accept corruption,particulalry not on our streets.corruption in the higher echelons of the society is still doesnt have the same potential to hurt people. corruption starts from the top and filters down to the streets. But the only way to finish it is to start bottom up
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