Urban Corruption Survey 2009
Youth Social Development‘s Urban Corruption Survey 2009 is a scientific attempt to facilitate the identification of unethical practices in public agencies in eastern India. By quantifying the costs of corruption, the study attempts to raise citizen’s awareness and hold government accountable on transparency.
Corruption and bribery are the crosscutting phenomenon in most of the government and public sector institutions in India. Thanks to Right to Information Act 2005, which has at least opened the scope for people and civil society organisations to know, understand and question dishonesty and unethical practices.
This Urban Corruption Survey is the second exclusive organised attempt by a local NGO Youth Social Development to divulge the unethical practices in government and public sector institutions in Brahmapur city of Orissa. This scientific analysis was carried out with the financial and technical assistance from the Partnership for Transparency Fund, Washington DC, USA an international NGO working to fight against corruption worldwide.
The study covered a substantial sample of 2003 households from both the slum and non-slum region in 27 wards of Brahmapur Municipality. Responses were collected on various issues namely institutions where corruption is prevalent, it severity, estimated costs and causes and citizen suggestions have been sought to check corruption. The basic services covered under this study are drinking water, municipality services, health care services, public distribution system etc.
The major findings of the survey include that 82% of the citizens had to give a bribe to obtain basic public services. Berhampur Development Authority and Land Record and Administration (Tehsil and Sub-registrar) services rated the most corrupted institutions in the city with 51.44 and 40.65 bribery index respectively.
This was followed by Public Distribution System and Drinking Water with 35.37 and 33.70 bribery index respectively while the overall bribery index remains at 36.52 out of a maximum score of 100. It is evident from the study that the common citizens pay a bribe of Rupees 57.73 million while availing basic public services.
Fear of harassment and delay in service delivery remains two important reasons for paying bribe. Other reasons include unavailability of procedural information and the difficult application procedure which compels citizens to pay bribe. The overall citizen satisfaction with the service agencies remains poor in all most all services.
The district administration and the senior public officials of all the selected departments including the revenue division commissioner and district collector accepted this report. This report reflects the general trend of corruption common people face in their day to day affairs.
The Urban Corruption is a tool that helps stakeholders understand the existing realities related to corruption, transparency and the quality of governance with in their community/locality. The objective of the Urban Corruption Survey is to find out the extent of corruption at the local government level and to raise citizen’s awareness. Specifically:
- To find out the organizations, institutions where corruption is prevalent
- To quantify the costs of corruption to the average citizen
- To increase public interest in the issue
- To provide a basis for actions to be taken in the light of the findings of the survey
To read the survey, click on the attachment below.
