"GovernMint in India." - T.S.R. Subramanian, Former Cabinet secretary

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Wednesday, May 20, 2009 As of 12:55 PM (GMT +5:30 hours)INDIA

India's Greatest Failure

By PAUL BECKETT

NEW DELHI -- Since he retired as India's most senior civil servant in 1998, T.S.R. Subramanian likes to say that he can be spotted frequently on a golf course. Recently, using a stenographer (four decades climbing the bureaucratic ladder means you don't learn to type) he put his mind to a question that appears to nag him as he marches the fairways: What has gone wrong in official India?


Paul Beckett

It is a timely question, given that we are at the start of a new administration. And it is one Mr. Subramanian is eminently qualified to address, given his rise through the Indian Administrative Service to become Cabinet secretary under three prime ministers. It is also one he is eminently capable of fudging, given that same resume and the many vested interests he might feel obliged to protect.

Fortunately, he takes the attitude that if you're going to go to the trouble of thinking and writing, why coat it in gloss? The result is a pithy tome, almost a Victorian-style treatise, called "GovernMint in India." It assesses whether the Indian government is up to par when measured against the mandate of the Indian constitution. His verdict, if I may paraphrase: If the Indian government were a golfer, it would score quadruple bogeys on every hole, cheat on the score card, then grab the stakes the other players had bet with.

The average Indian, Mr. Subramanian says in a chat over lunch, just wants the basics from his government. "I don't think Indians care about disparity but they want a minimum standard of living, food, a place to stay and clothing," he says. These are all things that the government has singularly failed to provide to the masses in the 62 years since independence.

“Since no part of the Establishment has an interest in punishing corruption, trying for a more sweeping solution quickly leads into the realm of blind hope.”
Why is that so? We start with history. The British may have committed many atrocities here but Mr. Subramanian speaks admiringly about the efficiency with which they ran the civil service and the caliber of those who inhabited it. An important factor in their success, however, was the fact that their political masters were thousands of miles away and unable to interfere.

Then India minted its own constitution. The well-meaning framers, he says, failed to appreciate what would happen when the civil service and politicians operated in close quarters without significant checks -- legal, administrative or otherwise -- on how far the legislative class could influence the executive.

Thus the framework was set for a steady, and alarming, transformation in the balance of power and the purpose of government. Politicians, unleashed by the knowledge that they are very unlikely ever to be called to account for their actions, have come to dominate the civil service and twist it for their own gain.


T.S.R. Subramanian

The executive, staffed by bright men and women schooled in the limits of their authority, have proven no match. As he writes: "Sadly, many of the middle-level officers, with growing children to educate, elderly parents to look after, cannot bear the constant pressure, and buckle; they either switch off and become irrelevant to the system, or they join the politician, and all is well thereafter!"

The judiciary comes in for equally scathing criticism for its failure to bring politicians to heel and to exempt bad behavior that ordinary citizens would be jailed for. I sense no love lost between Mr. Subramanian and his brethren on the bench. At one point, he offers a theory as to the root of these judicial shortcomings. Judges and bureaucrats traditionally stemmed from the same English-educated class of graduates, he says. And "most people who came to the judiciary were people who failed the civil service exams."

Where does all this leave us? "The political class," he writes, "is the only one which is not constrained by any checks or balances, follows no effective code of conduct and considers itself a king or an emperor, while extolling the virtues of democracy." In person, he puts it more starkly: In the last government, there were three Cabinet-level ministers making money. Yes, that kind of money. And nothing was done about it.

GovernMint is a narrow polemic that doesn't go much beyond Mr. Subramanian's purpose of a governance scorecard. He is the first to admit that it doesn't seek to provide big answers partly, I suspect, because that is really where the hard thinking begins.

He does offer a few practical suggestions: Suspend politicians facing criminal charges, as civil servants are suspended pending trial. Establish a fast-track court just for government officials so that cases are resolved expeditiously. Persuade judges to make an example of a few political wrongdoers as a public flogging for the rest.

Since no part of the Establishment has an interest in punishing corruption, trying for a more sweeping solution quickly leads into the realm of blind hope. Mr. Subramanian believes the best way to retake the government and re-bend it to the will of the people is through what he rather surprisingly terms "a messiah."

"Could one hope that there will be a new messiah, who will rise from the political class, to deliver the nation?" he asks in the final paragraph of the book. At a book launch party last week, some members of a panel filled with The Great And The Good (Retd.) of Delhi lambasted that notion, suggesting it was hopelessly naïve.

The criticism seems to have stuck. Over lunch a few days later, Mr. Subramanian suggests that no one else on the panel had any better answers. And he makes a point of explaining that he did not mean "a person falling from the sky" but someone from within the system with the will and the public backing to cleanse it.

Does that person exist today? Maybe, he says, we just don't know yet. Maybe it's Rahul Gandhi, maybe its Nitish Kumar. One thing, he says, the public is starting to send a message with the election's focus on development that if that person emerges, he or she will have mass backing. Of course, the flip side is also true: "This government, if it doesn't look into development, will bite the dust and anger against the political class will come."

—Paul Beckett is the WSJ's bureau chief in New Delhi
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I Could not believe that this is true in some university in India

I Could not believe that this is true in some university in India, "Novel evaluation system works wonders for JNU", Dec 28th. The process of syllabus setting, weightage for attendance, question paper setting, evaluation in front of students, campus environment and teacher-student interaction are all healthy and promising. We can expect that JNU will continue to provide great minds to India to progress.

Sad decline in journalist values - by B.G. Verghese

"Sad decline in professional values" by B.G. Verghese (28th Dec in Tribune) has rightly called for 
reforms in Press Registration Act. 

All his four recommendations 

1.Public interest directors to act as guardians of the public interest,

2.mandatory broadcast regulations as found in every part of the world,

3.“private (ads for shares)treaties” be required to be disclosed mandatorily,

4.separate accounting of all advertisements and advertorial support for candidates under election expense" needs to implemented if we want to prevent our democracy from peril.

To Let / For Sale? Legalising prostitution is not the answer. Nab the traffickers. By RUCHIRA GUPTA

My comment on this article can he seen as comment number 16, posted on DEC 28, 2009 12:57 PM.

Inspiration for Peaceful India by 2047 AD

Inspiration:

The basic inspiration is from the visions of Indian freedom fighters, numerous literary works, government documents, Constructive workers, Humanists and Spiritually enlightened ones.

M.K.Gandhi

India of my dreams:

“I shall work for an India, in which the poorest shall feel that it is their country in whose making they have an effective voice; an India in which there shall be no high class and low class of people; an India in which all communities shall live in perfect harmony. There can be no room in such an India for the curse of untouchability or the curse of the intoxicating drinks and drugs. Women will enjoy the same rights as men. Since we shall be at peace with all the rest of the world, neither exploiting, nor being exploited, we should have the smallest army imaginable. All interests not in conflict with the interests of dumb millions will be scrupulously respected, whether foreign or indigenous. Personally I hate distinction between foreign and indigenous. This is the India of my dreams…..I shall be satisfied with nothing less.”

– Young India, 10-September-1931

On Swaraj:

“Swaraj of a people means sum total of the Swaraj (Self-Rule) of individuals”

- Harijan, 25-March-1939

 “Self Government means, continuous effort to be independent of government control, whether it is foreign government or whether national. Swaraj government will be a sorry affair if people look up to it for the regulation of every detail of life” - Young India, 6-August-1925

“Real Swaraj will come not by the acquisition of authority by a few but by the acquisition of the capacity by all to resist authority when it is abused. In other words Swaraj is to be obtained by educating masses to a sense of their capacity to regulate and control authority” - Young India, 29-January-1925

“Swaraj can be maintained, only where there is majority of loyal and patriotic people to whom the good of the nation is paramount above all other consideration whatever including their personal profit. Swaraj means government by the many. Where the many or immoral or selfish, their government can spell anarchy and nothing else.” - Young India, 28-July-1921

“Under Swaraj based on non violence nobody is anybody’s enemy, everybody contributes his or her due quota to the common goal, all can read and write, and their knowledge keeps growing from the day to day. Sickness and disease are reduced to minimum. No one is a pauper and labour can always find employment. There is no place under such a government for gambling, drinking and immorality or class hatred. The rich will use their riches wisely and usefully, and not squander them in increasing their pomp and worldly pleasures. It should not happen that a handful of rich people should live in jewelled palaces and the millions in miserable hovels devoid of sunlight or ventilation. In non-violent Swaraj there can be no encroachment upon just rights; contrariwise no one can possess unjust rights. In well organised state, usurpation should be an impossibility and it should be unnecessary to resort to force for dispossessing an usurper.” - Harijan, 25- March-1939

 Rabindranath Tagore:

Tagore’s Vision:

“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high, where knowledge is free.

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments, by narrow domestic walls.

Where words come out from the depth of truth.

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection.

Where the clear steam of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit.

Where the mind is lead forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action.

Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake.”

 Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru :

Nehru’s Vision

“That future is not one of ease or resting but of incessant striving so that we may fulfill the pledges we have so often taken and the one we shall take today. The service of India means the service of the millions who suffer. It means the ending of poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity. The ambition of the greatest man of our generation has been to wipe every tear from every eye. That may be beyond us, but as long as there are tears and suffering, so long our work will not be over.”

 “And so we have to labour and to work, and work hard, to give reality to our dreams. Those dreams are for India, but they are also for the world, for all the nations and peoples are too closely knit together today for any one of them to imagine that it can live apart Peace has been said to be indivisible; so is freedom, so is prosperity now, and so also is disaster in this One World that can no longer be split into isolated fragments.”

“May the star never set and that hope never be betrayed!”

“To bring freedom and opportunity to the common man, to the peasants and workers of India; to fight and end poverty and ignorance and disease; to build up a prosperous, democratic and progressive nation, and to create social, economic and political institutions which will ensure justice and fullness of life to every man and woman. We have hard work ahead. There is no resting for any one of us till we redeem our pledge in full, till we make all the people of India what destiny intended them to be.”

-“Tryst with destiny” speech by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, 14-15^th August 1947

Vethathiri

Prayer for welfare of the world (In Tamil):

“Let rain be generous upon the life on the earth

Let farmers till the land happily to produce surplus food

Let the welfare of all workers of the world grow

Let the concept of “Unity in Diversity” enhance our culture

Let the governance in the world be free of jealousy, rivalry and riots

Let the people of this world be free of ignorance, debt, poverty and social evils

Let the light of wisdom bring better life in this world

Let all our acts be towards righteous life”

- “Servant of the world” Vethathiri (1911-2006)

Swami Vivekananda:

To the educated Indians

“So long as the millions live in hunger and ignorance, I hold every man a traitor, who having been educated at their expense, pays not the least heed to them”

 Bhagat Singh:

In his last message of 3^rd March 1931 he declared that the struggle in India would continue so long as “a handful of exploiters go on exploiting the labour of the common people for their own ends. It matters little whether these exploiters are purely British capitalist, or British and Indians in alliance, or even purely Indian”.

 Rashtrasant Tukdoji Maharaj:

On Ideal Village and Ideal Pracharak (In Marathi):

“O Friends! To make an ideal village, Must have an Ideal Pracharak

Village works will be nicely done, By ideal pracharaks in days to come. (51)

For the bright future of a village, Must have Pracharak best.

He must be the man of character, Humble, Hard worker and Honest. (57)

Main Characteristics of Pracharak, He works without ruling power

And knows how to make an ideal village with his pure heart. (58)

He never expects a seat of power, Never worries about wealth,

His eternal flow of supreme love, Changes minds of villagers. (59)

He has only one strong desire, Public be always happier,

Poverty of public be vanished, By his labours and endeavours. (73)

Such a Pracharak be selected So that village will be idealised.

Seva Mandal be established for the cause of village service (122)

For the reconstruction of villages, Pracharak is the prime base.

The Gramgeeta is also for the sake composed Tukdya says”

- Chapter VIII, Gramgeeta, 1953

Dr. Durga Das Basu:

In his Introduction to the Constitution of India, Chapter 34, he says “Time has come for them (Indian Youth) to realise that they cannot reach their objective by political slogans or breaking their heads on streets, but by acquiring political education and encyclopaedic knowledge ranging from nuclear science to agriculture and the mass of laws by which this vast country is governed,- so that they can usher in an age of efficient administration, if and when they come to power.”

After discussing about the current electoral violence and malpractices in India, he says “This is not Parliamentary Democracy, bur its death knell. It will be a glorious failure of democracy in India if the younger generation does not cry a halt to this scheme of massacre. It is for them to rise as a man to protest against the nefarious mandates of the heads of various political parties.

Every Indian must look forward, to built up an India which will stand as a man against whatever calamity befalls our lot. The responsibility therefore lies on the younger generation to built up a united and stronger India, where each man will play the role of a poet, philosopher, warrior, and administrator, rolled into one, in cause of the motherland,- which stands paramount to the narrower interest of his family, community or political affiliation.”

Peaceful India by 2047 AD: Strategy

Strategy

‘Truthfully Governed Peaceful’ India through ‘Self Righteous’ Citizenry

All citizens and well wishers of India want India to become a peaceful and well provisioned country as early as possible. Many have toiled all through their life and even sacrificed their life for this cause. This book is an attempt to (a) Consolidate the vision for a peaceful India by 2047 AD (b) Provide an intermediate vision for 2022 AD (c) organise a Self Reform movement for transforming citizenry to build the India of our dreams

Having a single collective goal or vision for India is a prerequisite for making any purposeful effort in building a peaceful India, hence this book. Similarly without transforming the constituent elements that is citizens, transforming India is unrealistic, hence the call for Self Reform Movement.