When Corruption Becomes a Competition

When Corruption Becomes...

In today’s India, corruption is no longer a shame — it’s a race. Among government officers, there seems to be an unspoken contest: Who can loot more, faster, and wider?

IAS, IPS, Directors — people who were once the torchbearers of public service — now often measure success not by integrity or impact but by the number of properties they’ve grabbed across the country. One flaunts a house in Tamil Nadu, another in Kerala, a set of flats in Kukatpally, Kompally, and Gachibowli. Why stop there? Add Mumbai, Andhra, and a few more up north for good measure.

The honest officer in the same department is mocked — “Fit for nothing fellow… always after truth.” He is told he’s wasting his time, that he’s missing out on “opportunities” while his colleagues become crorepatis. The pressure doesn’t just come from peers — it often whispers from the home. Many times, a spouse’s nagging about a “better lifestyle” is enough to push someone from integrity to indulgence.

And here lies the silent tragedy: not only have we corrupted the system, we have corrupted the definition of success. Young recruits join the service not to serve the nation but to serve themselves. A good officer is no longer the one who delivers justice but the one who delivers wealth to his own family — legally or illegally.

This culture is destroying us from within.
Because when corruption becomes a competition, honesty becomes extinction.

India will not develop just because we pass new laws or hold more elections. India will change only when — in our homes — we stop measuring worth by square footage, car brands, and hidden bank accounts. When families start respecting the officer who returns home with dignity instead of the one who returns with a bag full of bribe money.

If we continue like this, the day is not far when truth will be seen only in memorials and museums, while corruption will become our culture’s proudest inheritance. And by then, no election, no party, and no leader will be able to save us — because the rot will be in our very bones.