Corruption Shameful

I am a modern, metropolitan, middle class man;
I do not like corruption;
I know corruption is the exclusive preserve
Of the non-English-speaking politician.

The bureaucrat and the CEO—
they have no corrupt intent;
whenever they are on the take,
it is for development.

Likewise, when high caste and fair skin
appropriate national wealth,
they have no graft or greed in mind,
but only the country’s health.

Or when media anchors and columnists
connect with lobbyists,
it is for no unseemly cause,
but only for India’s best.

There are those that tell you
that injustice, pogrom, penury
are far worse than corruption;
such is their idiocy.

After all it is god has made
the rich rich, the poor poor;
and god is a Hindu patriarch,
and pogrom is his cure.

Corruption, however, is a sinister plot
willfully set in motion
by Hindu-detractors and unionists
to destabilize the nation.

Thus only a market let fully loose,
and right-wing religious parties
aided by friendly media moghuls
can rein in the upstart smarties

who think they may the tables turn
on those who do corruption
for no benefits of their own,
but the welfare of the nation.

Lastly, them investigative agencies,
they must needs be saffronised;
or else they will the corrupt let go,
and in ways barely disguised

go after a Modi, a Zadaphia,
a Vanzarra, an Amit Shah,
telling the nation that mass killings
are worse than corruption, bah!

Just as the secularists propound
that Yedurappa is corrupt as well;
how far the calumny might go,
it is truly hard to tell.

They ask us why Yedu does not resign,
thinking nothing of Karnatak’s future;
these casteists do not know
that Lingayat is pure nature.

Now, having said my piece,
it is for you to make sense;
and should you fail in that regard,
admit you’ve no defence.

*
Badri Raina