This book provides a perspective for viewing the increasing levels of corruption in the higher echelons of politics and bureaucracy in post-Independence India, and the limits of popular struggles and legislative/administrative measures to combat it. Looking at the phenomenon as ‘deviance’ from norms and a systemic dysfunctionality, it argues that it can be resisted by effective strategies of mass mobilization under charismatic leaders.

Focusing on people’s participation, it traces the emergence of anti-corruption movements to the JP Movement of the 1970s and culminates with the protests led by Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev and the rise of the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party.