A govt official "X" was transferred. While handing over charge to his successor "Y", he informed him that there was a matter which Y should take care of - i.e., X had taken money from the treasury for digging a well in the office compound and had used the money for personal purposes, no well was ever dug.
Y smiled and told X to forget this and not to have any tension.
A few months later, X was visiting the same town and called on Y. After exchanging inane pleasantries, he asked Y whether he had sorted out the well matter. Y said he had solved the problem very amicably.
X became curious and asked for details, to which Y replied, "nothing yaar, I told the higher ups that the well is a nuisance in the compound and it needed to be closed. They gave sanction and I have taken money from Govt to close the (non existent) well. Thanks for giving me a method of taking money for personal use from the Govt.!"
Well, huge sums are spent on projects and we hardly see assets proportionate to amounts spent. Who can ever verify the "assets" created "under water"?
