The corruption has today become a culture in our democracy and it has in fact eaten up vitals of our economy. But some people are there fighting consistently to cleanse the polluted system. Therefore, running a Government with transparency is different than the one corrupted.

The current tremor within the NPF and subsequent dropping of the Finance Minister K Therie by Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio is not unexpected. Many eyebrows were raised when the political development took place which suggests that there is no transparency in the governance. The core issue of Therie's dropping was reportedly connected with the controversial central grant of Rs 365 crore.

The Opposition Congress led by its outspoken leader I Imkong had been demanding the Rio Ministry inside and outside the Nagaland Assembly to produce the so-called "White Paper" on the utilization of the central grant of Rs 365 crore. But all their attempts were in vain for the last about 2 and ½ years since DAN took over the reign from the Congress.

This indifferent attitude on the part of the Finance Minister (now resigns) and Chief Minister's silence on the issue perhaps provoked the Opposition Congress to take the help of the Central Government. They even warned that they would use the service of the central investigating agencies to unearth the "mismanagement" of the central grant of Rs 365 crore if the DAN Government continues to ignore their demands.

Now the matter is more compounded following Therie's clarification yesterday during the press conference that he had already issued "White Paper" on the utilization of the central grant of Rs 365 crore on August 25 last year. But the Opposition Congress dubbed it as mere statement not the "White Paper."

The question is why the Chief Minister had asked the Finance Minister to resign from his Council of Ministers if the latter was right. The Chief Minister was, however, allegedly unhappy with the Finance Minister over the controversial issue of the central grant of Rs 365 crore.

The DAN Government had inherited empty coffer from the Congress regime but they were fortunate to have a friendly Government at the Center at that point of time. The Vajpayee Government had readily given Rs 365 crore as one time grant specifically to wipe out the State's accumulated deficit and start with a clean slat. This was possible more so because of the BJP was in the DAN conglomerate.

Technically, the Finance Minister is responsible for the finances of the State but in other sense the Cabinets have a collective responsibility for the Governance. It is natural to target the Chief Minister if his Finance Minister fails to respond. Dropping Therie was Rio's sole raison d'etre than collapsing with him. Rio did it finally.

But Rio should not let the hell loose as the present crisis in his Ministry has the potential to plunge into a political chaos if he does not tread cautiously and diplomatically. He should remember that the NPF-led Democratic Alliance of Nagaland (DAN) Government came to power with a slogan of bringing a change with a complete transparency. Accordingly, the people of Nagaland had given them the mandate.

Imkong has been repeatedly cautioning the Rio Ministry that failure to come up with the "White Paper" on the central grant of Rs 365 crore would hound not only the Finance Minister but he (Rio) too. The ghost of Rs 365 crore has now really hounded them.

When the matter was raised by Imkong on the floor of the House, nobody took it seriously. They took it casual. Now everybody is stunned when the 2nd most powerful Cabinet in the Rio Ministry is dropped.

This is not the last lap of Imkong's journey but certainly, he is laughing up his sleeves today. He stands vindicated.

In a democracy, the role of Opposition is paramount and it makes the "Government perfect." But undermining and ignoring the Opposition can be safely described as immature political game. After all, anything can happen in politics, and in democracy, it looks quite silly when somebody talks big.