For objective assessment from TIB

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According to respondents to a TIB questionnaire , the greatest number gave their view that the police are the most corrupt. This was no wonder. Most of the respondents are from the ordinary strata of society. They come across the police most of the time in their day to day activities such as sights of traffic policemen taking petty bribes and see only the wrong-doings of the police. They have no access to the corridors of power or ideas about how corrupt politicians or the politician-bureaucrat nexus can be , how these evil doers steal fantastically big sums of money from the public purse through their wheeling dealings in tender bids, awarding tenders, granting permissions , influence selling, etc.
The amount of state resources or people's resources stolen or taken as bribes by this nexus amount to billions and billions of Taka. Police's total amounts of bribes would be contrasted as quite small if it were possible to compare the two - the bribes taken by the police on the one hand and the ill gotten public resources of the politicians and bureaucrats on the other.
Thus, TIB's findings need to be more realistic . Let the people voice their opinion based on more information about who are the czars of corruption. Let them not be short-sighted or prejudiced only against the police. Besides, such labeling also does not do justice to the police or helps their confidence any.
E R Shelly
Wari, Dhaka