How is black money created?
By wily politicians…. For e.g In Mumbai, to go and drink in a bar, an ‘excise permit’ is required. The permit itself cost Rs. 10. But this is the process :
1. Go to any court office or any place where you can purchase a Rs 10 court stamp fee.
2. Go to any permit issuing office e.g Bandra, Andheri, Malad etc.
3. Get and fill the application form with your name, date of birth, age, occupation, and address etc.
4. Stick the Rs. 10 court fee stamp on the application form.
5. Hand the clerk the application form, with your photographs, Photo id and Address proof etc.
6. Get the excise permit. (Lifetime permit cost Rs. 1,000)
But here is the catch. Why did the govt. introduce Rs. 10 for 1 time excise permit and Rs. 1,000 for lifetime? Simply - It is not because they want only people with permit to drink, and the permit cost a paltry Rs. 10, or 1,000 for a lifetime…. The idea is that police, or excise dept. could now go and raid a bar or a restaurant serving liquor and harass the hotelier or the bar owner, who to avoid a nuisance to his customers is willing to pay hafta to the police or excise officers, a cut of which end up with the politicians…
Another example would be to bring in land development regulation. FSI to be limited to 1.33 or 2 (pick up any number) does not matter. Now land being a premium, the lower the FSI, the lower the area that can be developed to construct a building… But here is the catch – declare FSI of 4, or 5 or higher as ‘slum development etc’ So now a builder who could build 100 flats can now build 250 or 300 on the same area…. But to get the area notified as SRA etc, tens or hundreds of crores eof rupees change hands. And this money goes into the hands of politicians…. Think of licences and permits to open a restaurant, medical or engineering college, hospital, a chemical factory etc. etc. Right from electricity & water dept, police, municipality officials, excise, sales tax inspectors, local politicians, labour inspectors, income tax officials, etc etc. get into the act …
These are just a very small example of ridiculous and opaque laws that are created to generate black money in the system… So instead of aiding business, politicians and bureaucrats throw in hurdles in path of business so that they can extract their pound of flesh… Rules are created to interfere rather than help business and economy….
Things are changing but slowly. Real change will come when there is openness and transparency and ease of doing business. But as long as our politics and politicians depend upon the very same black money to stand for elections, nothing will change, no matter what laws are passed and how many committees are established for the purpose....