Corruption
Bangladesh is a developing country, and by definition, poor. The state and society both have to cope with severe socio-economic and political pressures, such as a chronic scarcity of resources, unpredictable political changes and needs associated, frequently, with post-colonial upheavals, as well as the intervention of outside forces which bring with them alien ideas and often alter the dynamics of the country. These circumstances, accompanied by wide disparities in income distribution and the needs of vast numbers of people who survive under conditions of extreme poverty, add a new dimension to the prevalence of corruption.
Corruption is a topic of interest and concern in academic circles, in the media, among people of different professions, within the civil service, among members of parliament, politicians, government officials, members of the business and financial communities, students, foreign investors, aid agencies and non-governmental organisations. In other words, the term corruption is not new to Bangladesh.
A general impression conveyed by the media and by popular discourse is that among ordinary people in Bangladesh, corruption is viewed quite clearly as 'a way of life'. A recent survey carried out by the Bangladesh Unnayan Parishad reinforces that impression. The survey found, among other significant data, that 95 per cent of respondents believed that the police were the most corrupt department in the land, followed very closely by the customs, the department of excise and taxation, the bureaucracy, and the judiciary. A solid 62 per cent of respondents believed that the primary responsibility for corruption in Bangladesh lay in the hands of government officials.
Corruption as behaviour, process or activity, is impossible to quantify. Consequently, for social scientists the functional argument which focuses on the 'positive' aspects of corruption necessarily provides only a means of understanding process. Thus, while it might be argued that corruption functions as a useful mechanism to aid social, political or economic exchange, the relevance to social science lies in the process as activity, without reference to its normative qualities. Consequently, while this Study adopts many 'functional' arguments, it does so in a non-judgemental way. Similarly, it is argued that in the developing world, corruption is a form of indirect taxation which, if removed, would cause bottlenecks which would prevent the smooth functioning of government and business. Furthermore, analysts argue against the assertion that corruption is a waste of resources. They point out the fallacy in the assumption that resources 'diverted' into graft would otherwise have been spent productively, or redistributed to the poor, claiming that resources 'saved' from graft would most likely be spent on luxury items, not on development projects.
So, we must try to build up moral resistance against corruption and achieve digital Bangladesh.
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