CAMDEN, Maine –Birth certificates. Driver’s licenses. Ration cards.

In India, these and other documents are the essential records of everyday life, as they are in most of the developed world. Government papers are necessary for virtually every aspect of professional and family life: applying to college, getting a job, buying a home. Read More.

5th Pillar India, a Chennai-based NGO, has come up with an innovative way to fight corruption. The NGO has designed, printed and distributed notes in zero-rupee denominations, urging people to hand them out whenever anyone asked for a bribe. The notes, which look like the normal rupee notes, carry the name and telephone number of 5th Pillar, and the pledge, “I promise to neither accept nor give bribe.”

THE CHALLENGE

Minimizing corruption in India is about a lot more than getting citizens to report on bribe requests. The real challenge lies in addressing a climate wherein corruption is status quo — people expect to encounter it, anticipate paying bribes in exchange for basic government services, and don’t think that reporting on it will change anything.

In India, where corruption costs the public and private sectors millions of dollars a year, demands for petty bribes are frequently signaled in code: ”Take care of me” or, for a two-note handout, ”Make Gandhi smile twice.” Illegal demands by police and bureaucrats are ”deeply ingrained in the culture,” says anti-corruption crusader Vijay Anand, and are “taken as the norm.”

It is now a way-of-life to bribe someone for getting a job done in a Government office. Even though the government officer is supposed to do his duty, we are pushed to bribe to get a birth certificate or driving license or marriage certificate or land registration etc.