From companies, employees to students, honesty no more the best policy

NEW DELHI: The old proverb of "Honesty is the best policy" is no longer applicable and has become a thing only read in books as companies, employees and even students are not ready to tread on the path of honesty anymore. The analysis was done by Zee News Editor-in-chief Sudhir Chaudhary on his popular show DNA.

As per a survey conducted by Ernst and Young in the year 2015, three out of every five company in India has admitted to misrepresenting their financial information. As many as 60 per cent of the companies claimed that such 'errors' in the company accounts are justified. While 66 percent of the executives of these companies admitted that their companies do not follow the set of ethics and honesty laid out by company policies.

In a 2019 survey conducted by McAfee, 35 percent of Indians believe that they have been cheated in the name of online discounts, which rises to 60 per cent during the festive seasons.

While it has been found that employees too waste time in the office and it has a negative impact on the productivity of the company. According to a survey conducted by Time Doctor, a software company that monitors the work of employees, employees waste 14 per cent of their time in office by having unnecessary conversations among themselves.

After this, the defect in computers and laptops during work is responsible for wasting another 11 per cent of the time. Employees waste at least 11 per cent of their time in meetings on unnecessary debate or conversations, while 9 per cent of their time is wasted on surfing the internet. So in a nine-hour shift, if the employee wastes his time in all these ways then he has worked faithfully for only three hours a day.

Even in the field of education honesty has become a bookish term.

In the year 2017, a survey was conducted by an institution called Kessler International, 86 per cent of the students admitted that they had cheated in some way or the during school.

* 54 per cent of the students justified copying.

* 97 per cent of students who cheated admitted that they were never caught cheating.

* 76 per cent of the students agreed to have copied assignments from another student.

* 79 per cent of the students admitted that they completed by copying information found on the Internet.

* 28 per cent of the students claimed that while taking online classes, they made someone else sit in their place.

* 72 percent of the students admitted that they have used devices like mobile phones, tabs and laptops for cheating in the examinations.

Only 12 per cent of the students participating in this survey called cheating an immoral act.

It is said that only an honest student becomes an honest businessman, industrialist, leader or employee but with ethics set so low how will we build an honest nation.