THIS is apropos of Moazzam Husain’s article ‘A lack of clarity’ (Dec 17) in which he tried to define corruption and believed that graft and theft were not part of corrupt practices.

In his quoted lines, he gave a clean chit to the Punjab government and tried to put the federal government’s responsibilities on the people and the NAB chairman.

According to the ‘Oxford Online Dictionary’, corruption is defined as ‘dishonest or fraudulent conduct by those in power, typically involving bribery’ whereas the ‘Merriam Webster Dictionary’ defines it as ‘impairment of integrity, virtue or moral principle’.

The question is: when an MPA steals gas for his mill, isn’t it corruption? It costs the exchequer as well as the public in terms of inflated bills.

According to the writer, the government official or the plumber involved in giving the illegal connection is corrupt and not the MNA or his mill. Is it corruption or theft?

Take another example. If a contractor gets a contract of a certain project with a percentage for government officials, will you call only the percentage corruption or the whole process?

If you are planning to have a private housing society and you are a part of the government or close to the government, because of your influence the federal or the provincial government commission provides utilities and roads for your society with tax money, ignoring the other people.

Will this be considered corruption or serving the people?

We are in an era of classified corruption. It is the duty of both the provincial and federal governments to legislate according to the needs of the time.

If they try to be like an ostrich and bury their heads in the ground, then they will be at fault as they won’t be able to fix anything or punish anybody.

A CITIZEN Peshawar Cannt