WHEN I was Chairman, New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), one day I heard a lady arguing loudly with my Personal Secretary, insisting on meeting me. It was not a scheduled time for people to meet me but I told my PS to let her in. She entered and, in a choked voice, narrated her plight. She was a teacher and her husband was to be operated upon in Vellore the next week. She had applied for a loan three months earlier but it was yet to be sanctioned. If she did not get it, the surgery would be postponed and her husband would eventually die.
I asked her to come the next day and collect the cheque. I then instructed the concerned officers to leave the cheque in my office at 10 am. She did come and collect the cheque and I forgot about the incident.
Three months later, she arrived with sweets and said the surgery had been successful and that she had just been to Balaji tem ple where she prayed first for me and then her husband. As she thanked me, tears rolled down her cheeks.
This episode convinced me that a bureaucrat can contribute a great deal towards the welfare of both individuals and society.
I appeared for the IAS examination on the encouragement of my father, a doctor. I had become enamoured of the IAS when the son of an IAS friend of my father stayed with us in Mirzapur. I was a postgraduate in English from DAV College, Kanpur and became a lecturer in Khurja.
Coming from a small city, when I joined the service in 1965, it was a novel experience to be rubbing shoul ders with Rhodes scholars, university toppers, and sons and daughters from some of the country’s most influential families. But I made my niche in almost every group except the KTPs (Key in Type Probationer)!
I vividly recall the Director of the National Academy of Administration (later renamed Lal Bahadur Shastri Academy of Administration), MG Pimpupkar, an ICS officer of very high integrity.Probationers considered him a terror.He told us not to fear transfers for political considerations — the worst a politician can do to an honest officer.He would cite his transfers, more than the number of years of service he had put in. Pimpupkar enforced punctuality and anyone late for physical training or rid ing classes had to run two or three rounds of the playground. Latecomers to other classes were denied entry and marked absent. The worst was when you were late for dinner. You were not allowed entry to the dining hall. It was common for probationers to go to bed hungry or eat at the food stall near the gate. However,what impressed me most was that once he took a decision he never reviewed it.
‘With 37 years of service behind me, one change I
have seen is that the decision-making process has
become slower. However, with the selection of more
qualified and well-informed young people, the stan
dard of the civil service has improved’
After passing out from the Academy in 1965, I was allotted the Union Territory (UT) cadre. As UT did not have a district for on-the-job training of officers, I was sent to Pauri Garhwal as SDM. My next posting was Paharganj, Delhi. At that time, Delhi was a small town and very clean, with wide roads and friendly people.As SDM, I was in charge of police,executive and judiciary and there was no separation of work. In 1969, I became Director (Industries), Goa. I stayed there for six years (1969-75), serving as Collector, Secretary (Revenue) and Chief Secretary. Goa was very peaceful, clean, and sparsely populated.The leadership was non-interfering.
Shashikala Kakodkar was Chief Minister.When I was Director (Industries), the Birla group was setting up a chemical factory called Zuari Chemicals. Zuari is a river, which the factory started polluting. I served a notice, ordering closure of the factory until an effluent treatment sys tem was installed. It remained closed for three months and reopened only after the plant was installed. Nobody inter vened or questioned my decision. This cannot happen today. A District Magistrate will be transferred if he dares take such a decision. When the Emergency was imposed in 1975, I was a District Magistrate in Goa. Things improved overnight: people came and left office on time, buses plied on schedule, everybody was disciplined, political interference in official work disappeared.
I was Finance Secretary, National Capital Region of Delhi just before the scheduled inauguration of the Asian Games on November 19, 1982 — the birthday of Indira Gandhi. The govern ment, worried at the slow pace of various projects, appointed me Chairman, NDMC to ensure timely completion.
The biggest challenge was the construc tion of the Talkatora Swimming Pool which was a mandatory condition to hold the Games. I formed a monitoring committee which worked round the clock and took decisions on the spot. I myself was available to the staff at any hour of day or night to sort out problems.
It was during my tenure in the NDMC that Shivaji Stadium, Talkatora Indoor Stadium, the NDMC headquar ters, and the underground parking in Connaught Place were completed. The NDMC was a small organization with enough money. The problem was that it planned big projects only on paper and lacked the courage to utilize available resources. I changed this mindset.
With 37 years of service behind me, one change I have seen is that the deci sion-making process has become much slower. However, the silver lining is that with the selection of more qualified and well-informed young people, the stan dard of the civil service has improved by leaps and bounds.
‘As a civil servant I have always held that the bureau
cracy should be allowed to function independently
without any fear of or intervention by the political
masters. I have seen the way Jagmohan, as Lt
Governor of Delhi, got work done by officers’
Being a Union Territory officer, I have often been asked why Delhi has not developed the way it should have.As a Chief Secretary, I have experienced Delhi’s major problem — the influx of people. Delhi has certainly developed but it has failed to keep pace with the fast-growing challenges. It is shocking that,for the past 50 years,Delhi has been facing a power shortage and will contin ue to face it for want of proper planning. Also,every time a master plan is made it becomes a political casualty. As regards poor infrastructure, Delhi is a victim of the transport, builder and landowner lobbies.Our every innovative attempt to turn Delhi around was always stalled by this all-powerful trinity.
As Chief Secretary, I wanted to improve the transport system by roping in Volvo, an international bus manufac turing company.Volvo submitted a pro posal to supply 2,000 buses every year so that in five years the number would swell to 10,000 buses.They would also main tain the buses and operate on routes. In return,they wanted only freedom in fix ing routes and fares. Unfortunately, the other transport lobby got active and the proposal never fructified.
As a civil servant I have always held that the bureaucracy should be allowed to function independently without any fear of or intervention by the political masters. I have seen the way Jagmohan, as Lt Governor of Delhi,got work done by officers.He always asked them to start the task without waiting for the orders. He would call for the file the same evening and have it cleared. The best thing about him was that he took total responsibility for all his decisions.
The officer who influenced me most was SD Srivastava.When I was Finance Secretary and Secretary, Planning, he was Chief Secretary of Delhi.He had a wonderful capacity to grasp a subject and arrive at a solution quickly. I recall an incident regarding a Planning Commission meeting that both of us were to attend for annual sanction of grants. He did not have time to be briefed about the meeting and asked me to brief him during the 30-minute drive from Old Secretariat to the Planning Commission building.When he made his presentation, I marvelled at his mas tery of the subject
