I was in Mumbai recently to watch a friend take his company public. He began in 2008 and built something India used to import: the propulsion system of a railway engine. That evening, we dined at one of the city’s famous hotels. The food was stale. The reason may have been anything — a slow evening, a careless hand. I make no accusation. But my own reaction surprised me: I silently thanked Tukaram Mundhe for tearing down kitchen doors across Maharashtra.

For decades, this country absorbed filth in food as its own standard until the law against it read like a foreign document. It has taken an officer willing to be widely disliked to make us look. Thirty-three years among officers taught me how rare and how costly that willingness is.

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And yet, the two careers sat side by side in my mind all week. My friend, the founder, started in 2008 and stayed in one place. The officer started in 2005 and has passed through 25 offices, gaining national attention in his 21st year, for a hygiene drive. Both men are builders by temperament: impatient, exacting, and contemptuous of the excuse. Only one of them has built something that will outlive his........

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