Most stark in both the anti-corruption protests, andthe recent critiques of Anna Hazare is something which both sides share – a profound distrust of the state itself. Hazare’s Gandhian style is not only significant in its evocation ofthe ‘father of the nation’, but also in its reflection of older critiques of the colonialsystem as being ‘corrupt’, and as a regime which encouraged and nurtured societal corruption.
Despite running a byzantine structure of administrative rules and procedures, the British in India rarely referred to the problem of ‘corruption’ as such. ‘Integrity’ among governmentservants was expected, but it was poorly policed and based on the assumption thatthe (largely white British) superior administrator was ultimately the principal figure who couldbe ‘corrupted’ in a serious way. He, unlike his Indian subordinate, had muchto lose and more to maintain asfar as the regime was concerned.
When faced with elected Congress regimes’ attemptedexposure of administrative and police corruption in the late 1930s, colonial officials fell back on arguments that what Congressmen describedas ‘corruption’, might often be better defined as ‘custom’. The British Raj wasrun on a financial shoe-string, with officers thinly stretched overvast areas and populations. It was heavily dependent on armies of Indian subordinates, and could ill afford to consistently root out the ‘customary’ arrangements which securedits authority in the locality. Powerful landowners might control the local police constable, or compel free labour among the landless poor. The Raj needed him to help maintain law and order, and pay revenue. A local revenue official might take a commission (or ‘dasturi’ – customary payment) to allow cultivators access to land records, or a railway official might accept a ‘gift’ (or ‘daalii’) to arrange faster carriage for consignments ofgoods.
But for most colonial officials,such arrangements were seen as an intrinsic dynamic of Indian society: classically, British utilitarian thought, represented by the likes of James Mill in the early 19th Century, presupposed the wastefulness, indolence and corruption of ‘Oriental’, ‘Asiatic’ and ‘despotic’ formsof governance, as found in India.
Britain’s supposedly ‘rational’ system of revenuemight thereby discipline the essentially corrupt societal interactions of India. The sonof James – the philosopher John Stuart Mill – was influential on British administrative thinkingaboutcorruption as ‘custom’: the younger Mill in his later political theory, privileged the idea of ‘sentiment’ as much as ‘reason’ in human affairs. Studies of national habits, imagination and traditions were a means of comparing different social institutions across the world,and particularly the difference between Occident and Orient. In studying the permanence of such ‘native institutions’, many advised against their reform, as natural facets of the social environment.
In 1952, following its first General Election, India became the world’s largest democracy. But its political system still rested (as it does today) on a structure ofpower inherited from the Raj,principally in its administrative and police cadres. The 1950 Constitution was based to a great extent on the colonial constitution passed in 1935. When Indira Gandhi, followingallegations of electoral irregularities, declared a State of Emergency in 1975, she was exercising a state power thathad underpinned the colonial system. Yet since 1947, and largely because of past struggles against imperialism,citizens have asserted the right to contest these vestiges of authoritarian power. Elements of this right to protest are writ large today – and whatever the outcomeof Hazare’s campaign, and whether or nota tough Lokpal Bill finally finds its way into the statute book, it is clear the turbulentrelationship between Indian citizens and the state will continue to flourish.
William Gould, Senior Lecturerin Indian History, University of Leeds, is the author of Bureaucracy, Community and Influence: Society and the State in India, 1930-1960s (London: Routledge, 2011)
®™ RNK
Tuesday, 18 December 2012
Corrupted India
Most stark in both the anti-corruption protests, andthe recent critiques of Anna Hazare is something which both sides share – a profound distrust of the state itself. Hazare’s Gandhian style is not only significant in its evocation ofthe ‘father of the nation’, but also in its reflection of older critiques of the colonialsystem as being ‘corrupt’, and as a regime which encouraged and nurtured societal corruption.
Despite running a byzantine structure of administrative rules and procedures, the British in India rarely referred to the problem of ‘corruption’ as such. ‘Integrity’ among governmentservants was expected, but it was poorly policed and based on the assumption thatthe (largely white British) superior administrator was ultimately the principal figure who couldbe ‘corrupted’ in a serious way. He, unlike his Indian subordinate, had muchto lose and more to maintain asfar as the regime was concerned.
When faced with elected Congress regimes’ attemptedexposure of administrative and police corruption in the late 1930s, colonial officials fell back on arguments that what Congressmen describedas ‘corruption’, might often be better defined as ‘custom’. The British Raj wasrun on a financial shoe-string, with officers thinly stretched overvast areas and populations. It was heavily dependent on armies of Indian subordinates, and could ill afford to consistently root out the ‘customary’ arrangements which securedits authority in the locality. Powerful landowners might control the local police constable, or compel free labour among the landless poor. The Raj needed him to help maintain law and order, and pay revenue. A local revenue official might take a commission (or ‘dasturi’ – customary payment) to allow cultivators access to land records, or a railway official might accept a ‘gift’ (or ‘daalii’) to arrange faster carriage for consignments ofgoods.
But for most colonial officials,such arrangements were seen as an intrinsic dynamic of Indian society: classically, British utilitarian thought, represented by the likes of James Mill in the early 19th Century, presupposed the wastefulness, indolence and corruption of ‘Oriental’, ‘Asiatic’ and ‘despotic’ formsof governance, as found in India.
Britain’s supposedly ‘rational’ system of revenuemight thereby discipline the essentially corrupt societal interactions of India. The sonof James – the philosopher John Stuart Mill – was influential on British administrative thinkingaboutcorruption as ‘custom’: the younger Mill in his later political theory, privileged the idea of ‘sentiment’ as much as ‘reason’ in human affairs. Studies of national habits, imagination and traditions were a means of comparing different social institutions across the world,and particularly the difference between Occident and Orient. In studying the permanence of such ‘native institutions’, many advised against their reform, as natural facets of the social environment.
In 1952, following its first General Election, India became the world’s largest democracy. But its political system still rested (as it does today) on a structure ofpower inherited from the Raj,principally in its administrative and police cadres. The 1950 Constitution was based to a great extent on the colonial constitution passed in 1935. When Indira Gandhi, followingallegations of electoral irregularities, declared a State of Emergency in 1975, she was exercising a state power thathad underpinned the colonial system. Yet since 1947, and largely because of past struggles against imperialism,citizens have asserted the right to contest these vestiges of authoritarian power. Elements of this right to protest are writ large today – and whatever the outcomeof Hazare’s campaign, and whether or nota tough Lokpal Bill finally finds its way into the statute book, it is clear the turbulentrelationship between Indian citizens and the state will continue to flourish.
William Gould, Senior Lecturerin Indian History, University of Leeds, is the author of Bureaucracy, Community and Influence: Society and the State in India, 1930-1960s (London: Routledge, 2011)
®™ RNK
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