India slips 6 spots to 86th rank on corruption index.

India ranks 86 on corruption index

A disappointing downfall has been showcased by India on the corruption Index. The country's ranking on Corruption Perception Index-2020 dropped from 80 in 2019 to 86 in 2020 while its score decreased by a point to 40 from 41 in 2019. This descent has depicted our non-progressive efforts in the direction of a corruption free economy. This Index is released annually by Transparency International which ranks 180 countries on basis of the perceived level of prevalent corruption in the public sector as suggested by economists, experts and business people. On the scale ranging from 0 to 100 it assesses the performance of the country with 0 being highly corrupted and 100 being corruption free. The top spots have been grabbed by Denmark and New Zealand with utmost high of 88. Taking the lead, the next spots have been acquired by Finland, Singapore, Sweden and Switzerland (85 each). Similar to previous year, the global average lies around 43 with about more than two third countries lying below 50.

The data by global civil society depicts that some countries failed to overcome the barrier of corruption effectively by showing a little or no progress. Syria with the low score of 14, Somalia and South Sudan with the lowest of 12 occupied the bottom slots in CPI. The Asia-Pacific region, comprising 31 countries, hits the average of 45. India score of 40, is lower than both Asia-Pacific Average and global average. China with a score of 42 leads India on rank 78. Pakistan performed fairly poor with a score of 31 and rank 124. In Asia-Pacific region, New Zealand is top scorer. Other top performers were Singapore(85), Hong Kong (77) and Australia (77).

The low scores of key economies India, Bangladesh and Indonesia of 40, 36 and 27 respectively asserts their slow progress on the anti corruption front. The government reforms are promising yet not effective said CPI 2020. According to this report, corruption is more pronounced in nations which are least equipped to face the challenges posed by Covid 19. Covid 19 spread with a surge in health, economic and social crisis.