双语新闻：印度“煤炭门”引爆政界贪腐内幕

英语自学网

Scandal Poses a Riddle: Will India Ever Be Ableto Tackle Corruption?
        　　His business rivals never fully understood how Manoj Jayaswalgot so rich so fast, except that he often seemed joined at thehip with powerful politicians. He hosted them at lavish parties, entertained them at his daughter’s opulent Thai wedding andstood among them at India’s presidential palace, where a yearago he was praised as a leader in the India growth story.
        　　马诺吉·贾亚斯瓦尔(Manoj Jayaswal)为何会如此迅速地致富，他生意上的竞争对手永远也不会完全理解，只知道他似乎跟一些位高权重的政客往来密切。他用奢华的派对招待这些政客，在自己女儿华丽的泰国婚礼上款待他们，还会与他们一同站在印度的总统府里，一年之前，他在这里被誉为印度经济增长的领导者。
        　　But now Mr. Jayaswal is embroiled in a $34 billion coal mining scandal that has exposed the uglyunderside of Indian politics and economic life: a brazen style of crony capitalism that has enabledpoliticians and their friends to reap huge profits by gaining control of vast swaths of the country’snatural resources, often for nothing.
        　　但是，贾亚斯瓦尔如今却卷入了一场340亿美元的煤炭开采丑闻。这场丑闻揭露了印度政治和经济生活的肮脏内幕：政客及其友人通过一种厚颜无耻的裙带资本主义赚取了巨额利润，方式则是取得本国大片自然资源地区的控制权，往往还不用付出任何代价。
        　　“Today in India, politicians are so powerful,” said Santosh Hegde, a former Supreme Court justicewho recently led a sweeping investigation of a different mining scandal in southern India. “Alltogether, they are looting the country.”
        　　“在今天的印度，政客掌握着极大的权力。” 前印度最高法院法官桑托什·赫格德(Santosh Hegde)说道，他最近领导了对另一个印度南部采矿丑闻的全面调查。“他们正在合力洗劫这个国家。”
       

1497146_095718_1.jpg

        　　Coalgate, as the scandal is now known here, is centered on the opaque government allotmentprocess that enabled well-connected businessmen and politicians to obtain rights to undevelopedcoal fields. Investigators are now looking at whether Mr. Jayaswal and Vijay Darda, a member ofParliament, conspired to fraudulently obtain five lucrative coal allocations. Naveen Jindal, anotherlawmaker and one of India’s richest industrialists, is also reportedly under investigation.
        　　这场丑闻目前已经被这里的人们安上了“煤炭门”(Coalgate)的称号，丑闻的核心是不透明的政府分配过程，那些人脉广泛的商人和政客通过这种过程获得了开采未开发煤田的权利。调查人员目前正在调查，贾亚斯瓦尔是否与印度国会议员达尔达(Vijay Darda)合谋骗取了五块有利可图的煤田。据报道，国会议员纳温·金达尔(Naveen Jindal) 目前也在接受调查，此人还是印度最富有的实业家之一。
        　　Even as the scandal has renewed public anger about rising official graft and the state of theeconomy, Coalgate has provided fresh ammunition for those who say India’s politicians havebecome so venal and feckless that they are no longer able or willing to address the country’sentrenched problems. The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, which was already on the defensivebecause it had been implicated in Mr. Hegde’s investigation, has been so eager to score politicalpoints with the latest scandal that it shut down Parliament for weeks with floor protests. It refusedto allow any debate — even of Coalgate — or any voting unless the prime minister resigned overthe scandal. Almost an entire session was lost.
        　　“煤炭门”丑闻不仅再次激起了公众对于官员贪污愈演愈烈以及目前经济情况的怒火，更为一些人提供了新的证据，让他们借此指责印度的政客已经变得极其腐败、极其不负责任，以至于不再有能力和意愿去解决印度那些根深蒂固的问题。因为被卷入赫格德的调查，作为反对党的印度人民党(Bharatiya Janata Party)一度处于守势，随着这次“煤炭门”丑闻的爆发，该党迫不及待地想要捞取政治分数，于是便通过抗议使得国会陷入瘫痪，时间长达数周之久。该党拒绝任何辩论或投票，甚至是关于“煤炭门”本身的辩论，除非总理为这个丑闻而辞职。这件事情闹得国会几乎瘫痪了整整一个会期。
        　　This sort of political dysfunction is hardly new in India and, in recent years, the economy wasbooming even as the politicians dithered. But now that the economy is slowing sharply, particularlyin the ailing energy sector, analysts say India can no longer afford a government that so flagrantlyfails to deliver what it promises.
        　　这种政治混乱在印度并不是一个新问题，近些年来，即便政客们踌躇不定，经济仍然在繁荣发展。但是现在，经济增速大幅放缓，特别是在境况不佳的能源部门，分析人士称，对于现在这个根本无法实现承诺的政府，印度已经无力承担。
        　　On Friday, the government approved long-pending proposals allowing foreign retailers, airlines, broadcasters and other companies to enter the Indian market in an effort to shore up the falteringeconomy.
        　　上周五，政府批准了搁置许久的一些提案，允许外国零售商、航空公司、广播公司以及其他一些公司进入印度市场，目的是提振步履维艰的经济。
        　　A decade ago, India’s leaders announced an idealistic slogan — Power for All in 2012 — andpledged to bring electricity to every corner of the country, partly by expanding coal-fired powerplants. India still has more than 300 million people living without electricity, and this summer, itsuffered the biggest power blackout in history. The scandal in the coal industry, meanwhile, hasmade it even harder for the country to generate enough electricity to meet its needs.
        　　十年前，印度领导人宣布了一条理想主义的口号，“2012年户户通电”，并承诺将电力输送到全国的每一个角落，具体措施之一是扩建煤电厂。可是目前，印度仍有超过3亿人过着没有电的生活。并且今年夏天，印度遭受了历史上最大规模的停电。与此同时，煤炭行业的丑闻使得这个国家更难生产出够用的电力。