« Desi Aunties gone wild: Aunty convicted of honor killing :+: Narain get a new agent or stop giving interviews. »

Brown in America

NRI charged with trying to bribe US official

By: Santosh :+: Under: Brown in America, Crime, Opinion, Politics
On: ⋅ July 27, 2007 ⋅  Email this post ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment
Discuss in our off-topic forums

Looks like you are new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

If Dollars were the same as rupees…

The Delhi Police have a saying “When in rooms do as Roman does”. Elsewhere they say “When in Rome …….”. The idea is the same - the local way of doing things may be your best option on most occassions. Mr. Jiguveshkumar Patel, a.k.a, Jay, tried to bribe an US Dept. of State official and paid the price.

From the article:

A Wall Township convenience store owner was arrested Wednesday on charges he attempted to pay $40,000 to a U.S. Department of State employee, in exchange for a multiple entry visa for his business partner’s son.

This is how it went down:

Patel, according to the complaint, became aware that the daughter of a patron worked for “Immigration.”

Patel approached the patron and offered to pay the individual’s daughter initially $20,000, and later $40,000, for a visa.

Patel told an undercover agent, who was posing as the patron’s daughter, that the son was interested in a multiple visa.

Patel got busted (this one, courtesy UberDesi).

This highlights a problem with immigrants, Indians in particular - assuming that you can throw money at a problem, namely bribe a government official to take care of any problem, like we do in India.

Take the instance of the man who tried to bribe a driving instructor in Dubai.

An Indian man in Dubai was put on trial for trying to bribe a driving instructor to pass in a driving test. The 28-year-old Indian, identified as AA, on Wednesday denied the charges before a Dubai court and said the money was a fee. On April 11, AA allegedly offered dirham 1,000 ($272) to the driving instructor, as he felt he committed mistakes during the test and feared failing it.

Instead of taking the moral high ground, and I cannot for good reason, I offer ye a hypothetical scenario. Obviously, Mr. Patel has $60,000 in cash since he could afford to offer a bribe of that amount. Consider this, A major portion of “hard money” for political campaigns in the US comes from individuals.

Assuming an individual has that kind of money to spare, if that individual “donated” a portion of that in political contributions to the Congressman and Senator in his area, over a few years. Donations to campaign finance are legal and I believe, the donor can write off on his taxes. When that individual’s business partner’s son has, lets say, immigration troubles, a simple telephone call to the Congressman or Senator, goes a long way in resolving those issues. It’s called having political clout. If that individual or someone in his family or community had some issues to address, the Congressman/Senator would be willing to listen to them and even offer to help. Of course, the bigger the amount of money, the more attention paid.

When in Amrika, ………

A desi uncle would ask: “What is the guarantee?”
Quoting a famous Amrikan politician:
“In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.”
-Benjamin Franklin

In other words, there are no guarantees, Uncleji. But just remember the other option Mr. Patel chose - the desi way - by trying to bribe a government official and its consequences.

If convicted, Patel can get a jail sentence of 15 years and a fine of up to $250,000.

Thoughts, opinions?

« Desi Aunties gone wild: Aunty convicted of honor killing :+: Narain get a new agent or stop giving interviews. »
Discuss in our off-topic forums