Corruption in India

Corruption in India is an issue that affects the economy of central, state, and local government agencies and is frequently blamed for hindering the country's economic development. A study conducted by Transparency International in 2020 recorded that 39% of Indians had paid a bribe to a public official to get a job done in the preceding twelve months. In the 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index (released in early 2026), India scored 39 on a scale from 0 ("highly corrupt") to 100 ("very clean") and was ranked 91st out of 182 countries, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector. India's score has fluctuated only slightly (between 36 and 41) since the current version of the Index was introduced in 2012, indicating a perceived lack of significant progress in tackling public sector corruption. For comparison with regional scores, the best score among those countries of the Asia Pacific region that appeared in the 2025 Index was 84, the average score was 45 and the worst score was 15. For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score was 89 (ranked 1), the average score was 42, and the worst score was 9 (ranked 181, in a two-way tie). Various factors contribute to corruption, including officials siphoning money from government social welfare schemes. Examples include the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and the National Rural Health Mission. Other areas of corruption include India's trucking industry, which is forced to pay billions of rupees in bribes annually to numerous regulatory and police stops on interstate highways. The news media has widely published allegations of corrupt Indian citizens stashing millions of rupees in Swiss banks. Swiss authorities denied these allegations, which were later proven in 2015–2016. In July 2021, India's Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) replied to...