Programme: Inside Story
Telecast: 28th December ‘03, Sunday 9:30 pm
Repeat telecast: 30th December 03, Tuesday 4:30 pm & 1st January ’04, Thursday 2:30 am
Adaptation: Jigme Palden Pazo

Major scams of 2003 come into focus in the last and final episode of The Inside Story of the year. From Telgi fake stamp paper racket to the CAT paper leak and DDA housing scam, nothing hogged the headlines during the year than scams of one kind or another. The Inside Story takes viewers behind these headline-hitting scandals examining the reasons and tracing the repercussions resulting from them.
Apart from the above mentioned cases, there were many others, prominent among them being Daler Mehndi’s human trafficking racket, Taj Heritage Corridor and Zee News Dhamaka. Name any major scam of recent times and it’s a safe bet that it took place in the year 2003.
At the rate scams were coming to light as the year unfolded, it would appear that at any given point of time, a similar incident was being exposed somewhere or the other. The conscience of the nation was repeatedly shocked as scandals followed one after the other. Inspite of it all, the feeling persists that ours is a country that can be termed corruption-proof. The sensibilities of the country has been bombarded so relentlessly by cases one more shocking than the other, that we seem to have been dulled into acceptance.
Justifications have become easy to arrive at. Blame it on corruption as a global phenomenon or on failure of the system. Therefore, when a police officer is caught accepting a bribe, or a traffic policeman pocketing a handout, the explanation is that the system is the culprit and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. It’s as if the idea of reforming or cleansing of this system has never occurred to the Indian citizen.
However inspite of this callous attitude, all is not lost. It is not necessarily a battle against corruption that has been lost before it has even begun. There is no reason why even if we can’t rid India of corruption, it can certainly be curbed to a great extent. And the most effective way of going about this task is to continue in our quest to expose the fool-hardy who indulge in it and take them to task.