Custom of corruption

Custom of corruption
The CBI catching customs and central excise department senior officer, KB Mahadik, red-handed accepting a bribe of Rs1.9 crores shows the level of corruption in India (‘CBI nabs customs officer accepting Rs1.9 crore bribe’, DNA, January 10). This loot of public money is only the tip of the iceberg. One can imagine the plight of genuine passengers/exporters/importers who have paid up to satisfy the greed of these officers. The CBI said “the act established a conspiracy between the said public servants and the CHA (Clearing & Handling Agency), a habitual bribe giver”. It is easy to blame the CHA for giving bribes but has anyone thought why it does so. The CHAs are compelled to bribe as they can be charged a hefty duty/penalty or their goods held back by customs if they refuse.
— Yash P Verma, Pune

Against RSS
Apropos the report ‘Indresh Kumar sends notice to CBI’, (DNA.Sunday, January 9), the allegations against the RSS and its leaders appear to be a conspiracy and Swami Aseemanand appears to have been made a scapegoat. The conspiracy also diverts the attention of the public away from the corruption issue. What was the need for the Congress secretary Digvijay Singh to say that Hemant Karakare, who died in the 26/11 terror attacks, had spoken to him about Hindu organisations threatened him?
— Achyut Railkar, Mumbai

Dragon’s incursion
Recently, India’s over-six-decades-old complaint about Pakistan’s invasion of Jammu and Kashmir, was treated by the UN as unresolved, and hence it was deleted from its records. However, China seems to have given India another opportunity to carry on this “glorious” tradition. As per some press reports, China made incursions into the Indian territory of Ladakh. The UPA-II government should at once “repeal” this daylight aggression by simultaneously launching counter “attacks” on two fronts. First, they should alert the UN Security Council about the dragon’s intransigence; and South Block should send a strong protest note to the Chinese embassy warning them against repeating such a misadventure in future.
—Arun Malankar, via email