RICHARD SPRINGER : June 17, 2010
STANFORD, Calif. – It is the million rupee question: What is the typical reaction when an Indian bureaucrat holds out his palm expecting it to be greased and receives instead a “Zero Rupees” note?
According to Vijay Anand, president of Chennai-based anti-corruption organization 5th Pillar, the typical response has been to quickly withdraw the hand and get moving with the citizen’s legitimate request.
Anand told an audience at a conference here hosted by Stanford University’s India Association (I-W, June 11) that 5th Pillar has now distributed more than one million Zero Rupees notes throughout India.
Testimonials from Indian citizens who have used the notes to brace bribe-anticipating officials have been universally positive, he told India-West, after a panel discussion at the “Brainstorming India” conference at Stanford.
The Zero Rupees note was the brainchild of University of Maryland physics Professor Satindar Mohan Bhagat in 2001. The notes read: "I promise to neither accept nor give a bribe."
Anand said his direct impetus to launch 5th Pillar came after passage of India’s Right to Information Act in 2007. A software programmer and systems administrator who came to the Washington, D.C. area in 1997, Anand returned to India in 2006 and obtained Bhagat’s permission to use the note.
The reformer said he viewed the convergence of the RTI Act and the note as a way to provide a way “for the common man to say ‘no’ to corruption and not put him in harm’s way.”
The organization visited villages and school campuses and held teach-ins to educate people about the evils of corruption. At the end of the presentation, 5th Pillar gave away the notes. They also approached people on the street to distribute them.
When bureaucrats found out that the citizens petitioning for such things as property transfers, tax refunds or other requests were backed by an organization, they withdrew bribe demands or halted their obfuscations, Anand said.
It also helped that corruption is officially punishable by a jail term in India, even if it is not generally enforced, he pointed out.
For those who continued to stonewall, 5th Pillar publicized details of procedures, bidding processes, etc., obtained under the RTI Act, and publicized the bureaucrats’ delaying tactics in the press. Officials or their superiors thus exposed to public scrutiny moved quickly to resolve issues, Anand said.
“I am 95 years old and 5th Pillar helped me to draft a RTI petition which revived payment of my old age pension that was stopped and pending for six months,” said Rajammal Salem in a testimonial on 5th Pillar’s brochure.
Other strategies employed by 5th Pillar have included rallies and one gathering where college students signed a 30-foot Zero Rupees banner.
Fifth Pillar has now started a chapter in Hyderabad and contacted students at more than 600 colleges.
Anand has two prongs in his anti-corruption organizing. Besides leading 5th Pillar, he is also active with the Lok Satta Party, whose founder and president, Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan, a member of the Andhra Pradesh state Assembly, was the charismatic keynote speaker at the Stanford conference.
Lok Satta will run a slate of candidates in the 2011 elections. “Our platform is to encourage individuals to engage in the civic process,” Anand told India-West.
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