Crooks and cuckoos, we have them all.

Scarcely 24 hours after we wrote about the bad law to force motorists to get pollution certificates for their cars every 3 months, by denying them petrol, came the report that a staff at a petrol pump in UP was shot in the leg when he refused petrol to motorbike riders for not wearing helmets. Right next to that was a report that pollution checking centers were using pirated software and the certificates issued by them were worthless. Apparently there are not enough inspectors to check vehicular pollution so the government is passing it on to petrol pumps. It would be so much better if, instead of forcing checks every 3 months from petrol pumps, the law allows checks at the time of servicing. Modern cars need servicing every 10,000 km, so someone driving 100 km a day will need to service his car every 3.5 months and those who drive little have to get their cars serviced once a year anyway.  Also a major cause of pollution is adulteration of fuel with cheaper alternatives. Since fuel is totally under its control it is the government's duty to ensure purity. It must take away the price difference between petrol and diesel by adjusting taxes, so that both cost the same as in other countries, and add a harmless color to kerosene to make it stand out. Sadly, our politicians see themselves as our masters and not as servants. The Health Minister of Chhattisgarh has admitted that zinc phosphide, a rat poison, contamination in antibiotics resulted in the death of 13 women who underwent tubectomy. Not just that, capsules contained just 200 mg of Ciprofloxacin instead of 500 mg. Not just shady companies, even major pharma companies are selling substandard medicines. Crimes need to be investigated. But by whom? The Director of the CBI, our ace investigative agency, has been told to stand down from the 2G scam investigation by the Supreme Court for trying to protect some of the accused. As is usual, he has refused to resign and will retire in December with full pension, just as BB Mohanty did. No sharam, no izzat. We elect politicians to pass laws to serve us and to keep officials under control. Can they? A Trinamul Congress leader has alleged that the bomb blasts in Burdwan was a conspiracy between BJP and the CPM. Er, so 9/11 was a conspiracy by the CIA and flight MH 370 was plucked out of the air by aliens from another galaxy. With crooks everywhere we need our judges to punish them with long jail terms. Right? Apparently, 300 lower court judges are being probed for irregularities in buying computers and laptops. Crooks and cuckoos, no wonder we are the most optimistic nation on earth.