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Empowering the Watchdogs
The real fighters against corruption are the whistle-blowers.
An important, yet overlooked, aspect of the recent Nirav Modi case, where the jeweller and his associates have been charged with a bank fraud estimated at₹11,400 crore, is the role of the whistle-blower. In 2016, Bengaluru-based Hari Prasad had alerted the Prime Minister’s Office and the Registrar of Companies about major irregularities by Nirav Modi’s partner, Mehul Choksi, owner of Gitanjali Gems. Despite this, no action was taken and Choksi’s name only emerged after Prasad spoke to the media about his
earlier warning.
That the authorities did not take these warnings seriously is now a familiar story. Starting from 2003, when a young engineer, Satyendra Dubey, was murdered for exposing corruption in the Golden Quadrilateral highway project, the fate of a series of whistle-blowers has been dire. While some like Dubey are killed, others have faced threats and violence, or their warnings are ignored. These incidents receive episodic media and public attention.
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