Corruption and brotherhood

US diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks, at the very least and in no uncertain manner, confirm torture of detainees and human rights violation by Indian security forces in Kashmir. And this came at the time when the country is mired in a cesspool of corruption, which is virtually on verge of deluging everything. The murky picture gets murkier by the day. There is hardly an institute public or private that has escaped the fall into a deep abyss of cronyism. Indian business, politics, judiciary and media seem to be vying each other for attaining distinction in corruption. There are shadowy lobbyists doing bidding for their industrial masters and journalists providing conduit to political influence in getting pliable appointees and favorable decisions. Shrill-voiced media journalists while masquerading as guardians of nation; consort with the politicians on behalf of shadowy lobbyists for shoddy political appointments and deals. That should at least rest soul of those who never spare any opportunity in censuring the entire political clan and it should mightily hearten them that their brethren be it in judiciary or industry or bureaucracy in no way lag behind when it comes to being corrupt. Gagging of news of involvement of so-called prominent media personalities in influencing political appointments to suit their benefactors had a singular similarity to the exhibition of solidarity by the political class across the party lines in dealing with the morbid saga of Jain brothers’ dairies . Those dairies discovered a few years back by Delhi police while chasing terrorists, implicated almost all the politicians from all shades, with a few exceptions, in murky ‘hawala’ deals with proceeds indirectly in most likelihood going to the terrorists. That was one time when politicians closed their ranks and the offences that would have attracted charges of treason were neatly stashed away in courts and from the public view. There was never any demand for joint parliamentary committee to investigate and none clamored for investigation by independent agencies. Similarly now Indian media displayed an unflinching brotherhood and never investigated their own for their misdeeds. If there was ever anything worth to be investigated, that would be Abu Ghraibs run by Indian security forces in Kashmir where detainees, militants or mere suspects, have been reported to be tortured in more ways than one.   
-Rajiv Kumar