a fool and his ministry...

how do you come to terms with a situation wherein someone you trust your future bread, butter and cable tv with
goes and deposits the same trust in a speculating cheat? the least you expect of a minister is that he should have a little more sense than a semi-literate housewife who would perhaps, in understandable circumstances, be tempted to part with her prized jewellery in the expectation of doubling it, to a charlatan masquerading as a tantrik. those minor incidents of deception evoke, among other emotions, a feeling of sympathy for the victim. should we sympathise with a public official who gave away the equivalent of, roughly, the average yearly earnings of around 5500 indian families?
what's being paid, not returned , is damages. by a company which has a long history of covering up, burying, or simply refusing to acknowledge the questionable actions of authorities at the very top of its echelons. a sizeable portion of volkswagen's dark record of slave labour in nazi germany has not been disclosed until now. so the company, a pastmaster at this game, is moving quickly to sort out the misdeeds of a mere representative to pre-empt the minor embarassment of legal proceedings in india, in order that it can concentrate on defusing the major embarassment caused by much bigger fry at home.
the minister has the sympathies of his boss. after the initial euphoria over the news of damages being paid, the minister would perhaps sit down and calculate how much he has lost: i'm not implying any kind of brokerage. only the investment in acreage that seemed a sure thing until yesterday. boy, does he need sympathy!
a fool and his money are easily parted, they say. a fool and his ministry? well, the minister can check in next door.. and wait for the next schustler-hustler to come around on an even more alluring special purpose vehicle to take him for a rollicking new ride.
an afterthought: shouldn't it be our government which decides the extent of damages it has suffered?