Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (MS)

Bengaluru, Oct 29: A mammoth 1000% increase in corruption cases for the year 2017 was recorded in Karnataka in comparison to 2016. This information was made public by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). This increase is the highest ever recorded in the whole country.

The recorded cases of grafting were just 25 in 2016. But their number jumped to a staggering 289 in 2017. However, according to certain experts in this field, it may be due to the low base number. Other experts felt that the cases reported in 2016 may be an anomaly. They are of the opinion that if the figures for 2017 are compared with that of 2015, in which 259 cases pertaining to corruption were reported, the increase is just marginal.

Though the cases of corruption increased in 11 states, including Karnataka, the overall figure for 2017 for the whole country was 4,062 compared to 4,439 of 2016, which means it is a betterment. This is mainly because the graft cases were very few in other states and union territories.

According to a government officer, the reason for this projection of Karnataka state in bad shape in the whole country is due to the very punctual reporting of the graft cases, while many other states do not report them at all. So the state of Karnataka might be bad on paper, while in reality, there is an effective enforcement mechanism that works in the state.

Kerala was the best among the five south Indian states with a decrease in corruption cases by 67%, which is the highest number among the south Indian states. The overall figure of cases of corruption for all the five states of South India Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Telangana was 942 in 2017 against 878 in 2016. Some of the Union Territories did not report a single case, while one case each was reported from some of the north-eastern states.