In good news, India has effectively enhanced its ranking on a global corruption index in 2018. As far as its neighbour China is concerned, it is lagging far behind, as per the annual index released by an anti-graft watchdog on Tuesday.
India improved by three points to 78 in the list of 180 countries in the world whereas China is ranked 87 and Pakistan at 117 in 2018, the Transparency International said in its Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) for 2018 alone.
“As India gears up for its upcoming elections, we see little significant movement in its CPI score, which moved from 40 in 2017 to 41 in 2018,” the global watchdog said.
“Despite spectacular public mobilisation in 2011, where citizens demanded that the government take action against corruption and advocated for the passage of the comprehensive Jan Lokpal Act, these efforts ultimately fizzled and fell flat, with little to no movement on the ground to build the specialist anti-corruption infrastructure required,” it said.
The countries that stand on top of the list are Denmark and New Zealand, with excellent scores of 88 and 87 respectively. Somalia, Syria and South Sudan are placed at the bottom of the list, with scores of 10, 13 and 13 respectively.
US dropped 4 points since last year and with a score of 71 means that this is the first time since 2011 that the US falls out of the top 20 countries on the CPI, it said.
“A four point drop in the CPI score is a red flag and comes at a time when the US is experiencing threats to its system of checks and balances, as well as an erosion of ethical norms at the highest levels of power,” said Zoe Reiter who is Acting Representative to the US at Transparency International.
“If this trend continues, it would indicate a serious corruption problem in a country that has taken a lead on the issue globally. This is a bipartisan issue that requires a bipartisan solution.”
(With PTI inputs)
