It's good that victimised bureaucrats will be protected. But also look at the riot within
It was, if we are not wrong, laurence J Peter who once put it in a nutshell: “Bureaucracy defends the status quo long past the time when the quo has lost its status.” These and other such bon mots to describe what was once the “steel frame” of the Indian administrative structure as the British colonial state and its brown descendants would have it, strike pretty close to the bone when it comes to babudom in these parts. Yet, there is no denying that there are still some hardworking, upright officials who are victimised with a vengeance by the political establishment at the State level, especially over the past couple of decades when the fragmentation of our polity has resulted in newer and brasher players gaining power. So, in an environment where the old certitudes are lost, or at best confined the rarefied environs of lutyens' Delhi watering holes, the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) order passed last week directing the Centre to either change the cadre or place on Central deputation officials victimised by various State Governments so as to safeguard their interests is not unwelcome.
The specific order came in the case of a young Indian Administrative Service (IAS) official of the Bihar cadre who was falsely implicated in a bribery case and arrested by the State Vigilance Department for exposing the collusion between a local police-politician-official triad which was letting in goods carriers into the State without permits/papers for a consideration thereby causing a huge loss of revenue to the exchequer. Patna High Court later found the case against the official to be fabricated and struck down the criminal charges lodged against him. Subsequently, the official moved CAT for redress which passed an order directing the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) to either allot the official a different cadre or assign him a Central posting on deputation. The precedent set by the order is significant as it provides a way out for honest officials framed by the powers-that-be to prevent them from doing their job as public servants. So far, so good.
But what about bureaucratic accountabilityIJ Politicians are the favourite whipping boys in the popular narrative for having looted the country for over 70 years but politicians also go to jail and, more importantly, as elected representatives they can be turfed-out come election time. It is a fact that not a single scam involving public funds — that is tax-payers' money — in the history of Independent India could have been pulled off without bureaucratic collusion. Yet, Indian bureaucrats, still ‘generalists' by training (whatever their educational background before joining the bureaucracy) and having made it to a career in public service on the strength of clearing one, increasingly shabby albeit three-step examination, are in the main safely ensconced in sinecures. The reality is that it is near-impossible to sack a bureaucrat in this country. Inflation-linked pensions, official accommodation, health benefits and a host of other perquisites have ensured that the ruinous desire for Government employment which stirs in every bosom of this benighted land regardless of caste, class or ethnicity because it ensures a "permanent job" has paralysed India. There is no problem with all this and more, however, provided accountability in terms of a quantifiable results-oriented mandate, contractual employment and third-party audits were also to be accepted by the Indian bureaucracy. We live in hope.