No public servant or legislator can claim any privacy to take money for conducting their official functions.
The illegitimate money made by corrupt public servants and the power that it gives them is then also used to perpetuate them in office. This corrupt money is one of the main factors responsible for the continued reelection of such politicians. They become masters of the people they are supposed to serve.
The retention of the power to punish for contempt for acts of speech alone, which do not directly interfere with the administration of justice, has removed the last shred of accountability of the higher judiciary in the country.
You cannot cave in saying something that is against your conscience and belief. That self-righteous ego is a must for any self-respecting, truth-loving person.
Though the Income Tax Act obliges even non-residents to pay tax on incomes earned in India, many foreign institutional investors avoided paying taxes citing the Double Taxation Treaty with Mauritius.
It is inexplicable as to why the Chief Justice or other judges of the Supreme Court are unwilling to disclose their assets, particularly when they had themselves directed even candidates contesting elections to publicly declare their assets.
It is well settled in our Constitutional scheme that all Parliamentary Acts and mandates bind the executive. Any executive act, which violates any express or implied mandate of the Parliament, is unconstitutional and void.
A Judicial Bureau of Investigation under an independent Judicial Complaints Commission, should be set up to investigate complaints against judges.
Ultimately, it is only a powerful civil society movement which can break the vicious cycle of corruption in any society.
There exists a cell of policemen within the Delhi Police which is accountable to no one but itself. Operating without uniforms, these are the dreaded encounters specialists of Delhi.
The Dinakaran episode has brought to the surface the vexed problem of the arbitrary and totally unsatisfactory manner of selecting and appointing judges as well as the unresolved problem of dealing with complaints of misconduct and corruption against judges.
We must learn the correct lessons from the U.S. war on terror, which, far from making the U.S., its citizens and interests safe across the world has only increased insecurity worldwide and has led to many more terror attacks on U.S. interests and citizens across the world.
If public servants are freely allowed to take up lucrative post retirement jobs with companies to whom they have awarded contracts while they were in government, it would open up an easy way for companies to bribe public servants by offering them lucrative post retirement jobs.
It is this obsession with GDP and FDI growth and a facile belief that this growth in the GDP would trickle down to the poor as well, that has led to the neglect of the genuine concerns of the poor in the country.
Bringing accountability to the judiciary must be preceded by frank public discussion and debate. Unfortunately that cannot get started with the threat of contempt looming over people.
The public disclosure of assets by judges, though a welcome first step, is certainly not the end all of the serious problem of judicial accountability or the lack of it.
Joseph Stiglitz was the chief economist of the World Bank for three years till January 2000. Before that he was the chairman of President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers. No one can speak more authoritatively or with greater inside knowledge about the functioning of the Washington consensus institutions.