Too many laws, too little justice
To fight the monumental battle of rampant corruption in India, it is high time to address the issue as a priority; surely, India can follow the Chinese model to confront corruption that made China a global powerhouse. India’s vision of Viksit Bharat 2047 can be attained only when the country adopts a zero-tolerance policy against systematic corruption
India does not lack laws. It suffers from a shortage of consequences. Parliament has enacted hundreds of laws to regulate business, collect taxes, punish wrongdoing and protect citizens. Yet, corruption continues to flourish because enforcement remains uncertain, investigations drag on for years and powerful individuals can often use influence, money and procedure to delay accountability. The uncomfortable question is whether Governments and bureaucracies sometimes allow unnecessarily complicated systems to survive because such systems keep the political and administrative machinery relevant. The larger the bureaucracy, the greater the discretionary power; the greater the discretion, the greater the opportunity for rent-seeking. When an ordinary citizen cannot obtain a certificate, licence, permission, utility connection or Government service without approaching an intermediary, corruption ceases to be an exception and becomes part of the operating system.
The recent case study of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code illustrates this danger. The IBC was created with a legitimate and necessary objective to resolve stressed companies quickly and recover maximum value for creditors. A modern economy needs an effective insolvency mechanism, and genuine business failure should never be treated as a crime. An entrepreneur who builds a company, creates employment and subsequently fails because of recession, market disruption, competition, technological change or circumstances beyond his control must have an opportunity for rehabilitation. But the same protection cannot be extended to someone who deliberately diverts bank funds, creates shell companies, falsifies accounts, siphons assets abroad or manipulates lenders. Insolvency may settle a financial liability; it cannot wash away criminal liability. When creditors accept enormous haircuts on public-sector bank loans, the public has a right to ask who ultimately bears the loss: the bank, the depositor, the shareholder or the taxpayer. The fundamental principle must therefore be clear: failure should not frighten entrepreneurship, but fraud must frighten every person contemplating it.
The same standard must apply to public servants and institutions. Whether the person is a politician, bureaucrat, judge, police officer, regulator, municipal employee, banker or any other individual drawing salary, pension, wages or retainership from the public exchequer, corruption involving public money must carry consequences severe enough to change the calculation between risk and reward. India should seriously debate a stringent statutory framework under which a public servant convicted of serious corruption after a fair judicial process faces at least 20 years’ long-term imprisonment to the death penalty, confiscation and recovery of illicitly acquired assets, and permanent disqualification from public office wherever legally and constitutionally permissible. The purpose should not be revenge. It should be deterrence. A system in which a person can steal or facilitate the theft of public money and still retain wealth, influence and social standing after years of litigation is not a deterrent system; it is an invitation.
Today, corruption can sometimes appear to be a low-risk, high-reward activity. An investigation can take years, a trial can take decades and appeals can continue indefinitely. Witnesses disappear, records become unavailable, evidence weakens and public attention moves elsewhere. Meanwhile, the accused may continue to enjoy the proceeds of wrongdoing. This is where the Indian system needs a fundamental correction. The real deterrent is not the maximum punishment written in a statute; it is the certainty that punishment will actually follow misconduct.
The justice system itself must become an integral part of this reform. Deliberately forged documents, fabricated evidence, knowingly false affidavits and false testimony under oath should attract serious consequences, including 20 years’ rigorous imprisonment to the death penalty after due process. Honest mistakes, incomplete information and unsuccessful legal arguments must never be criminalised. But deliberate deception of courts and government authorities must become a high-risk activity. Courts cannot deliver speedy justice when litigants can manufacture documents, conceal material facts, file frivolous proceedings and prolong disputes for decades without meaningful consequences. Those who deliberately abuse the judicial process must understand that the court is not merely a forum in which endless arguments can be made; it is an institution whose authority cannot be manipulated with impunity.
This is where the India-China comparison becomes relevant, not as a recommendation that India imitate China’s political system, but as a warning about the consequences of weak enforcement. China began rebuilding its supervisory machinery during the reform era, including the establishment of its Ministry of Supervision in 1987. After 2012, under Xi Jinping, the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and later the National Supervisory Commission launched an exceptionally aggressive anti-corruption campaign. Senior officials, bankers, regulators, state-owned enterprise executives and local functionaries were investigated and punished. The campaign also pursued illicit assets and officials who had fled overseas. Whatever one’s political assessment of the Chinese system, one lesson is difficult to ignore: laws become meaningful when people believe that position, wealth and connections cannot automatically protect them from consequences.
India has the advantage that China does not have a constitutional democracy based on fundamental rights, judicial review, political pluralism and institutional checks and balances. India does not need political fear. It needs the fear of lawful consequences. The politician must know that public office cannot provide immunity. The bureaucrat must know that taking a bribe can end a career and destroy illegally acquired wealth. The banker must know that fraudulent lending can lead to imprisonment. The businessman must know that deliberate diversion of public money cannot disappear behind an insolvency haircut. The litigant must know that fabricated evidence can destroy his case. The taxpayer must know exactly what he owes, and equally importantly, know that the government is accountable for every rupee it collects.
Ultimately, corruption survives on four pillars: uncertain punishment, endless litigation, excessive discretion and diluted accountability. Remove these four pillars and the incentive structure changes fundamentally. The real test of governance is therefore brutally simple: can an ordinary Indian live, work, conduct business, obtain government services and access justice without bribing an official, hiring a tout, negotiating with an intermediary or spending years fighting the system? If the answer remains no, India does not need another slogan, another committee or another law or anti-corruption institution. It needs a system in which breaking the law becomes genuinely dangerous and obeying the law becomes genuinely easier.
The lesson from China should therefore not be authoritarianism. It should be accountability. India does not need a government that frightens its citizens; it needs institutions that make corrupt officials, fraudulent businessmen, dishonest bankers and habitual abusers of the legal system afraid of the consequences of their own actions. The ultimate measure of a strong state is not how many laws it can enact, but how certain it can make the consequences of breaking them. India has enough laws. What it urgently needs is institutional reforms and the courage to enforce them.
The author is a public policy expert and columnist; Views presented are personal.