Every Independence Day we are subjected to lofty speeches and sky-scraping phrases from leaders reminding the citizens of this democratic republic about their duties and the challenges that face the nation. Most Indians, it seems, shut their ears to them because the words come from the mouths of a sub set of people that ordinary folk have learned to regard with unadulterated derision – politicians.
Notwithstanding the fact that we vote them in and out regularly and avidly follow their deeds and misdeeds in Parliament, there’s always that ever-present nagging part of ourselves that yearns to do away with them. Alas, in the real world all democracies seem doomed, in perpetuity, to have to live with them. There is, in political theory or practice, no alternative – except dictatorship – to electing a nominee to enforce the popular will and represent disparate interests.
Except in Plato’s utopian Republic, I see few instances of these elected nominees – politicians – volunteering to do the maximum good for the maximum people. They must be coerced to do so in the interest of superior statecraft. The state, itself, therefore, must be an agglomeration of countervailing centres of powers and checks and balances that exerts a civilizing influence to temper and moderate the human proclivity towards greed, jealousy, violence, and the lust for power.
An independent civil service is one powerful instrument that has been designed by modern democracies to implement the utilitarian ideal of governance in the interests of we, the people. But, as the Indian experience has shown, this institution is subverted by those who would make it their fiefdom to convert the state into a personal milch cow.
Our 62nd Independence Day cover story addresses the issue of how the bureaucracy can be unshackled and be allowed to play its role as one of the moderating influences on political venality. We asked three former Cabinet Secretaries whether they saw this as a problem and how they would address it.
Veteran BG Deshmukh says both the nation and society are developing – if slowly. “This is in spite of, rather than because of, the government and the public services.” He sees rays of hope, however, in “a core, though tiny, of civil servants who are role models, of the young political generation which is honest and more committed, of enlightened groups in the private sector, and of strong and vibrant civil society groups.”
Surendra Singh places some faith in the Second Administrative Reforms Commission proposals designed to checkmate “the political master who looks to a pliable bureaucrat or police officer to help him in his (private) quest.”
And Prabhat Kumar offers a unique insight. Civil servants, he says, do have a natural lobby that will help insulate and protect them from the clutches of ruthless politicians: the common people! He observes: “Bureaucrats should not aspire to be a part of the economic and political elites but of the emerging social elite that boasts of people like Rajendra Singh, Aruna Roy, Vandana Shiva, Anna Hazare, Ramesh Ramanathan and Arvind Kejriwal. The civil services ought to join forces with civil society organizations to amplify the voice of the voiceless. Thus civil servants can become a part of the leadership structure of the community.”
Hear, hear. As the new Independence year dawns, it is heartening to note that people like Deshmukh, Singh, and Kumar, far from being retired or moth-balled, are still a vibrant and thinking part of this nation’s evolution.
