THIRUVANANTHAPURAM : The integrity of its people, has done Kerala proud in the survey on corruption carried out across the country. Kerala topped the charts among states having least incidence of bribery.
The survey titled India Corruption 2019 was conducted by LocalCircles and Transparency International India.
The survey found how 51 percent of the population in India end up paying bribes. The influx of black money and lack of corruption checks, is responsible for the alarming situation, says the research.
However in Kerala 90 percent of the those sampled said, they obtained services without bribe of any sort. Also the number of bribe takers have declined considerably in the state in the past three years. In its previous survey 31 percent employees were found to be bribe takers.
The national level sampling suggests a whopping 51 percent, in terms of citizens who were forced to offer bribes. Among them 24 percent have paid bribes multiple times and the remaining 27 percent once.
The report dubs CBI and state vigilance as passive onlookers. Computerisation and CCTV networks have not helped reduce instances of bribe taking, the survey pointed out.
35 percent of the bribing public paid cash directly to the concerned person and another 30 percent hand their money to agents. About 6 percent paid their bribes in form of gifts, says the study.
Incidentally, Transparency International India is an NGO working toward corruption free society while LocalCircles is an agency engaged in promoting better governance via social media avenues in order to understand collective issues, challenges, solutions and pulse at macro or micro levels.
