On a sweltering afternoon at Delhi's Jantar Mantar, thousands of students stood with placards rather than textbooks. Similar protests echoed through Amritsar, Mumbai and several other cities. Their demand was strikingly simple: let examinations test knowledge, not privilege. The anger was not merely over another paper leak. It was over a deeper betrayal the collapse of faith in institutions that promise equal opportunity. Corruption is often described as an economic crime, me