Unfortunately, there is no mechanism to identify these individuals before they are placed in some office of profit for the first time. As the track records are built up over time the corrupt people may gradually be winnowed out of strategic positions if the power structure so permits.

The congenitally corrupt people are, more often than not, powerful enough to dominate the structure and drive out the clean people from the system. They engineer corrupt practices, build their own network, and perpetuate the outfit in the system. Only a superior cleaning system, built at the behest of the chief executive and robustly supported by a committed team comprising strategically placed individuals, can purge the corrupt characters out of the structure.

This write up is meant for people who are not habitually corrupt. They are innocent people who have been catapulted to high offices of profit without the training and experience. Some of them have the commensurate stature, and their entering into offices of profit is taken as a natural phenomenon both by themselves and the common people. Their innocence about the entitlements, the rules and procedures, dos and don'ts, render them extremely vulnerable to unintended corruption.

In our official, social and family environment corruption has to be resisted both by knowledge and by stance. And resist we must persistently; almost moment-by-moment. Any laxity will allow corruption to creep into our office or family, and it will spawn rapidly to vitiate to the whole environment. It is, therefore, apposite that the innocent high ups be provided with a few tips so that they can effectively guard against corruption during their incumbency in the offices of profit.

Two distinct but not strictly contradictory tendencies, namely job orientation and facility orientation, reside in an incumbent individual. Someone is dominantly job oriented, facility orientation is a minor trait in him/her. For someone else it maybe the other way around, facility orientation is blatantly dominant.

A balanced mixture is also observed in some persons. Disproportionate facility orientation easily leads the incumbent to the path of corruption. She/he is obsessed with the facilities -- the palatial residence, the number of transports at his/her disposal, furnishing in the office and residence, the retinue of personal staff, probable foreign trips, discretionary funds available for use, the opportunity to distribute favour to near and dear ones, and other perks and privileges.

Having read his/her predilection, his/her personal staff and corrupt sycophants swing into action to cater to his/her revealed and concealed preference, mostly using corrupt means. They cook up inflated entitlements and present them verbally to incumbent high ups without any documentary support.

The facility oriented incumbent high ups find it convenient to believe the obsequious acolytes and shy away from demanding a printed copy of the entitlement. Corruption makes an easy inroad into the office and residence of the incumbent through his/her disproportionate facility orientation. Once it occupies a nook in the proximate area, corruption pours in big doses to vitiate the whole environment.

Apart from personal staff and ill motivated officials in the administrative hierarchy, corrupting influence on the incumbent high ups mostly comes from the following groups:

• Members of the family.
• Close relatives.
• Friends, near and dear ones.
• Social constituents.
• Flatterers and persistent self-seekers.

Each of these groups has its own ways to press its demands, however illegal they may be. Their nagging power, emotional blackmailing, creation of irritation through withdrawal of odd job support, threat of social ostracism, ego boosting strategies, vilification campaign and adversarial stance, are effective instruments for forcing the innocent incumbents to oblige them often through corrupt means.

The innocent incumbent is after all a human being, she/he has to live and move in the society and cannot afford to antagonise all these groups by declining to accommodate their unreasonable demands. At the same time it will be illegal and unethical to concede to their demands.

In order to overcome such sensitive and tricky situations one has to learn at least two things -- the basic rules in the matters relating to the demands, and the art of convincing the demanders about the dangers of conceding to their demands. She/he has to do this consistently so that a reputation is built around him/her that she/he is fair in his/her treatment, and that she/he tries to help people around him/her if it possible to do so lawfully.

Family is the basic unit of existence for an individual. It is built on emotional, social and legal bonda. A person lives in a family, most of the time takes his/her meal with the family, and most importantly sleeps at night with the family. One cannot avoid being in the family if she/he is in the town.

In the family environment one is surrounded by the spouse, the children and, at times, parents, siblings and in-laws. They can interact with him/her and place their demands almost any time she/he is in the house. The spouse occupies a special coign of vantage in this regard. One spends intimate hours with the incumbent and presses the demands more than anyone else, not infrequently using physical resources under his/her control. Children draw immensely from the vast emotional reservoir, the filial affection of the parents. The flow from this reservoir is naturally downwards.

Some innocent parents, specifically the mammalian ones, are affection blind towards their children. They cannot say "no" to them. As a result, they yield to almost any demand made by their children. Progeny management has been one of the most difficult tasks that the parents, including kings, fiefs and democratic leaders throughout the world, have faced since time immemorial.

Examples abound about the failure of the parents to rein in the unreasonable and illegal demands of the children, frequently buttressed by intense pressure from the spouse of the incumbent person. Unless fiercely resisted and forcefully argued out all through from the beginning, the innocent high ups will fall prey to corrupt practices in no time.

Close relatives have also easy access to the highly placed individuals. They can visit the residences of the high ups without any notice almost at any time of the day. It is not easy to avoid interacting with them when they have already entered the residence. There is emotional bond with many of them because they have been part of incumbent's life over years.

A small number of them are also close confidants of the incumbent, on whom one has to depend for practical support of varied nature. It has been observed that one or two of them become self-imposed personal acolytes, a sort of con man, of the incumbent high up.

In-laws have an extraordinary leverage because their cases are supported by the spouse. In many urban middle class families in-laws have been a source of great support for the incumbent high ups who might have a relatively humble origin. His/her umbilical dependence on the in-laws makes him/her extremely vulnerable to unreasonable demands from them.

The relatives take advantage of their access and emotional mooring to squeeze illegal benefit, either directly from the incumbent high up or by using his/her name and reference unethically. The innocent high ups often suffer these relatives because of his/her soft nature, or out of reluctance to antagonise them. Such an indulgent attitude gradually draws the incumbent person to the soft land of corruption, and one is bogged down to the no point of return.

The demands placed by the relatives, and their unsolicited advice, should be carefully catechized before any action is taken on them. The relatives should also be briefed about the power and entitlements of the incumbent, and be advised in unequivocal terms not to press for demands that have no ethical or legal basis.

At the same time one should earnestly help the relatives in realising their rightful demands. One should also listen to their sound advice for his/her own benefit. One has to maintain a delicate balance in helping the relatives by strictly adhering to the cardinal principle of remaining fair and honest at any cost.

Friends and near and dear ones are very important ingredients for a happy and enjoyable life. Dying means living without friends, according to Gabriel Garcia Marquis. A person values the company of friends, their emotion, their advice, support, opinion and evaluation. One will not like to be outcast or despised by them; one will like to be one of them instead.

Friends and near and dear ones have strong influence on the incumbent high ups. Some persons are abnormally soft towards their friends; they cannot disoblige the friends even if that is required on legal and moral considerations. They step into the corrupt path to save the friendship which they value so much, though it would be wise of them to remember that a true friend should not exploit the friendship for his/her personal benefit at the cost of the incumbent friends.

Friends must be helped to overcome their difficulties in a lawful manner, they must be protected against injustice, unfair treatment, discrimination, intrigues and assault by any quarter. The incumbent high up should use his/her power and good office in a descent and legal way to save his/her friends from the above types of misdeeds.

One may also use his/her discretionary power to proffer an innocent and non-financial privilege maintaining the spirit of Pareto optimality as far as possible. The most important thing is that one must communicate with the friends, and impress upon them his/her limitations and constraints; one must not shy away from them, or hurt them through insinuation.

Good friends appreciate the benign spirit of their friends in high positions, and would not press for an unseemly demand once the position is explained to them. Failure to provide financial benefits may be compensated by warmth of exchange and emotional rewards.

Every person has his/her own social constituents, unless one decides to live as recluse, sequestered from the society or the neighbourhood one lives in. She/he likes to mix with them, visit their places occasionally, interact with them, and be a party to community life. She/he likes to command love, respect, appreciation, compassion and support of his/her social constituents. She/he also wants to help them, promote their interest and circulate amongst them because she/he finds it joyful to behave that way.

Some members of this group would like to take advantage of this situation, or the predilection of the incumbent high up, and may come up with demands, which have corrupt implications. A person may couch the demand in a way, which shows that it is good for the community, club, society, class or the club she/he belongs to.

The incumbent high up may find it difficult to turn down the proposal summarily because it would appear surly. At the same time a person should not acquiesce to the demand, or give any commitment accepting it. She/he may softly tell the demander that she/he will examine the proposal sympathetically.

At the same time one may help the community, club or the class within the purview of laws and rules. It should be impressed upon the constituents that while she/he will not cross the legal and moral constraints, she/he would go all out to help the social constituents within the ambit of law and ethics.

Flatterers and persistent self-seekers are an endemic group ubiquitously found around the incumbent high ups. They have an ingenuous way of making inroads into the office or residence of the incumbent, and will tenaciously stick around these places. They will make every attempt to make their presence felt and come closer to the incumbent high up, and will succeed in most cases. Flattery and tenacity are the principal instruments used to realise their selfish objectives, often through undermining rules and procedures. They have mastered the art of stoking the ego of the incumbent and exacting illegal benefit for themselves, at his/her cost. They usually play upon the personal staff working at the office and residence of the incumbent high ups. With their help they come close to the family members and put pressure on the incumbent through these members.

Almost all individuals are susceptible to flattery of the appropriate type, and are ready to bend the rules to help the flatterers. Sometimes one is simply beaten by their pestering or tenacity. Flattery and persistent self-representation is dangerous for many innocent high ups, they do not know how to handle these notorious groups of high ingenuity.

The simple rule to handle these groups is to ferret out their ultimate motive through grilling them personally, or through capable officers of reputed integrity. The best way is to impress upon them that nothing will be done by flouting rules and regulations. Cases will be dealt with on their own merit; antics will not do in this office. The family members and personal staff should also be sternly warned against freely mixing with these people.

Perks, privileges and power are integral ingredients of high offices of profit. People love to enjoy these privileges. There is nothing bad about that, per se. The problem is that most of the people placed in these positions from the private sector are not aware of their lawful entitlements, and the procedure to use such entitlements.

They mostly act on their long nurtured perceptions and on the advice of their personal staff, proximate officials, family members, friends, near and dear ones. Unfortunately, most of the advice is wrong and ill-motivated. These are not based on the books; they are cooked to suit the predilection of the high ups, which the above mentioned advisers can read very fast given their long relations with the incumbent or long experience in the profession.

It is really dangerous and impractical to put an untrained and inexperienced person in a high office of profit, and expect him/her not to be led into corruption. The appointing authority has a bounden responsibility to orient the newly appointed high ups, either before one takes up the assignment or immediately on assumption of the office. The better way is to declare someone as a designate to a position, and send him/her to orientation sessions before one assumes the charge of the office.

A formal training or orientation course may be designed for the above mentioned high ups by the apex training organisation of the country. It may be a short course of only one week's duration. Some sessions may be earmarked to include the spouse and the grown up children of the incumbents. Any person neglecting the course should be viewed as a suspect, and the appointing authority should deal with the person accordingly.

Courses should also be arranged for the personal staff of the high ups, so that they behave properly and do not misguide their bosses about their powers and entitlements. Personal staff may be formally brought under surveillance of the government agencies so that they cannot use the office of the high ups for their own benefit, and put their bosses in jeopardy. Examples abound where the innocent high ups have suffered very badly owing to misdeeds of their personal staff.

While it is the duty of the government and the society to punish the habitually corrupt persons in high offices of profit, it behooves on them to protect the innocent high ups from unintentional lapses amounting to corruption.

Based on the contents of the orientation course, a simple guide- book may be prepared for these people so that they can consult the book whenever they are in confusion about their entitlements and constraints. A focal organization, and one or two focal persons, may be identified for the incumbent high ups for consultation whenever it is necessary.

Prevention is always better than cure. Why not apply this refrain for the benefit of the innocent high ups who intend to remain clean during their incumbency in the offices of profit.

Dr. Saadat Husain is Chairman of Public Service Commission.