Saturday, April 23, 2011

Conflict of Interest

A conflict of interest (COI) occurs when an individual or organization is involved in multiple interests, one of which could possibly corrupt the motivation for an act in the other.
This is what we see happening in the administrative,political,educational,media space in India.
             When majority of the educational institutions are owned by the politicans in power,how can we hope for tuition fees coming down,fair admission policies,transparent education system - The people running these are Businessmen first and then public servants and that is when it leads to a corrupt system.
             How could we explain the scams happening in corporate circles like 2G license scam or others.The politicans own stakes in many of the companies or control them through indirect means or have got favours in the form of election funds etc.
Take the case of Karnataka.The illegal mining industry has contributed to the deterioration of nature in the western Ghats and the parts of Bellary district.These mining barons control the government and you can imagine if at all this government will ever act to protect the environment around us,the drinking water in Bellary,the roads of Western Ghats, and the health effects people from these areas suffer from.
When the distinction between business and governance is not clear,it is difficult to see a transparent government which acts to protect the interests of the people and our country.
The biggest disappointment is how the Media,the newspapers and news channels function - failing to highlight constantly the ill effects of these actions(They can run hours of programming to telecast a murder or domestic violence case,but not anything against politicians.)
Sample this - Suvarna News channel owned by a politican backed by BJP,Kasturi channel by HDK,Janashri from Reddy Bros and plans of more channels to be started by politicians - we already know why they need their own channels.
If we have "Conflict of Interest" in media,we would never see a unbiased news coverage of whats going on around us and blind us from all the above issues which arise from "Conflict of Interest".








2 comments:

  1. Very good point Goutham... This COI is one of the main reasons for Corrupt politics. To add up to your list, Karnata CET engg and Medical seat sharing is an another example. In our days Govt quota was 80% many poor students used to get less fee seats.
    Since the politicians own many pvt engg and medical collages, they only make the policy for seat sharing they obviously favour pvt colleges.The result is Today Govt has only 40% seats today... Finally the people who suffer is 'The Comman Man'!

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  2. Yes.CET was the best managed entrance exam in the whole of India and this lobby and inaction by politicians reduced it to insignificance.
    We cannot hope for things to change for good until the government is free from the clutches of educational institutions(as politicians).

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