'Corruption in India runs on targets': ICAI member says it's not just customs as TN-based firm halts India ops

Dinesh Wadera, a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI), on Friday said that corruption is not just a problem; in fact, it is the biggest business in India. His take came days after Wintrack, a Tamil Nadu-based logistics firm, halted its import and export operations in India, citing alleged harassment from Chennai Customs officials. 

Wadera added that customs is not the only government department plagued by corruption. "From smallest gutter-cleaning contract to billion-dollar highway projects, from garbage tenders to GST refunds, nothing moves without greasing the system. This is not random chaos, it is a perfectly choreographed game of chess," he wrote on X. 

He further said that corruption in India "runs on targets", adding that every branch from traffic police to social welfare has a "collection goal". 

"Corruption in India even runs on targets. From the traffic police department to the tax department, from land revenue to forests, from health to energy, from home ministry to defence, from mining to social welfare, every branch has a “collection goal.” The more an official collects, the more secure his position. The most corrupt are not punished; they are protected and promoted." 

The ICAI member added that it is no longer about governance but about shielding the corrupt at all costs, adding that corruption has been institutionalised and legalised in practice in India.

"Corrupt officers and leaders behave like gangsters in suits, threatening, intimidating, blackmailing, extorting, and even eliminating obstacles without hesitation. The money flows upward with clinical precision, from the lowest clerk to the highest office. And the illusion is carefully maintained, that it’s just a few officers or a flawed system. No, it is corruption itself that rules. Citizens have not merely elected leaders, they have elected corruption."

Furthermore, he wrote in his post that it is the common man and the honest entrepreneur who dares to dream who pay the price. Towards the end of the post, Wadera wrote: "Unless this cycle is broken, India will remain a nation where the most profitable business is not technology, not manufacturing, not agriculture, but corruption itself."