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A reflected or refracted ray of light may be mellow like the moon borrowing the light of the Sun and being enveloped in soft glow. But in case of 'secondary corruption', a phrase you may coin to characterise a wife's witting or unwitting part in her husband's revealed/detected corruption, there is actually a reflected taint and culpability associated with it.
At a view-exchange seminar organised by the Transparency International Bangladesh(TIB) recently, an apparently startling revelation was made: Ninety per cent of wives 'incriminated' in cases of illegal amassing of wealth by their husbands said they had no idea of the process of their spouse's accumulation of ill-gotten money. Pleading ignorance they claim that they are being 'wrongly' accused in the graft cases their husbands are indicted with. Maybe, it was expedient for their husbands to be exploiting them. But it reflects negatively on them that they allowed themselves to be exploited.
Accused women in as many as 118 cases, according to chairman of the Anti-corruption commission, said, "They knew nothing" about what they were being charged with; but papers bear their signatures anyway, an obvious statement of fact the officials could scarcely ignore.
If ignorance of law is no excuse for breaking it, far less acceptable as defence against culpability, the pleading of innocence by wives who get to know their spouse like the palm of their hands carries very little conviction. More so when they serve as director or placed in other important positions as close confidente of their husbands. As they have to sign cheques, they couldn't have been unaware of the financial health of the company or the bank accounts they are part of.
Nevertheless, by far the larger share of blame falls on the husbands; for, they are the primary offenders, the real bribe takers in collusion with underhand wheelers and dealers, the wives may be unaware of.
The TIB report highlights some eye-opening facts: In the last decade some 29 women were convicted in as many cases of offences ranging from abetting in or concealing earnings by their spouses beyond their known sources of income. They had to serve prison sentences or pay fines. Of the convicted women,55 per cent of their spouses were politicians and 21 per cent were government functionaries or officials .
It has been a practice among the corrupt to have softer front to their business with the inclusion of their wives in it. The notion is based on a kind of selfish gender sensitivity on the part of the husband with a tinge of expectation that it might evoke sot-handling from those in charge of financial discipline. There is a societal trait among spouses to keep up with the consumerist and acquisitive tendencies of their peers.
One of the discussant's observation finds an instant resonance. The wives of influential people with a tainted reputation for ill-gotten money are educated persons and as such conscious citizens. So, it is difficult to assume that they sign any cheque presented before them or are not indeed privy to important decisions of their husbands. Actually, given trouble that befalls them and the family on account of the husbands' misdeeds, a resistive correctional effort must begin with them. Charity, as they say, in terms of moralistic defence mechanism, must begin at home.
It is understood that women's shouldering of the burden of self-created guilt or that having been imposed by their uncaring husbands, undermines their position in society, apart from risking their personal security.
In this context, one feels that more than legislation, sensitisation at the social, educational and familial levels has a greater chance of succeeding a holistic intervention.