Making things happen in the government
A fascinating lecture by Mr Anil Swarup (retired IAS, ex-Secretary to Govt. of India & State Govt of UP) at Lt Governer, Puducherry Raj Niwas. His Wikipedia page here and Twitter account here.
The first half is the talk itself, followed by some time of Q&A, followed by a short talk by Mr Ashwani Kumar (Chief Secretary to Government of Pondicherry) and in the end is Lt Governor Kiran Bedi.
Misc notes from this talk
- For an idea to fructify in a democracy like ours, it has to politically acceptable, socially desirable, technologically feasible, financially viable, administratively doable and judiciary tenable.
- Don’t get agitated about things over which you have no control.
- Key thing is to focus and change yourself and rest will just follow.
- The digitalisation helps significantly in reducing corruption and adding more transparency.
- For solutions to a large number of problems, we do not need to look outside (of the country) but inwards towards various states from the length and breadth of the country.
- There was a draconian section clause in the Prevention of Corruption Act 13 (1) d. The clause was: while holding office as a public servant, obtains for any person any valuable thing or pecuniary advantage without any public interest; or (source)
In simple terms, it means that if anyone makes an undue benefit in a process, the bureaucrat will be held for it whether or not he had any benefit from it. Eventually, Modi Govt. in the centre revoked it and this Gazette notification has a new law. Thus now for bonafide mistake bureaucrats are legally protected. - Culture of views & counterviews in the bureaucracy got deteriorated because of RTI activism. “RTI activist” end up in matching the notes of multiple officers & then try to play them against each other.
- Systems like Aadhar should have been respected & promoted but became a major target of “activist brigade”. I personally had a discussion with some of the folks who are heavily against the Aadhar and would even go to the extent of suggesting to shut down the program. While they might make a couple of valid points, but a large part of their points come with the fundamental assumption that rest of society, systems, identification technologies etc are utopian in nature!
- E-office system of Govt. needs more improvement. In some case, it’s just another system and a process where one has to dump scanned documents instead of actually digitalising.
Ending this post with a poem from Mr Swarup in Hindi! ЁЯЩВ
рд╕рдордп рд░реБрдХрд╛ рдирд╣реАрдВ, рд╣рдо рдХреНрдпреВ рдард╣рд░ рдЧрдП? рдЕрднреА рддреЛ рд╣рдо рдЪрд▓реЗ рднреА рдирд╣реАрдВ, рдлрд┐рд░ рдХреНрдпреВ рдердХ рдЧрдП?
рдЙрдареЛ рдкрдерд┐рдХ, рдЙрдареЛ рдкрдерд┐рдХ рдордд рднреНрд░рдорд┐рдд рд╣реЛ рдзреВрдорд┐рд▓ рдЕрдВрдзрд┐рдпрд╛рд░реЗ рдореЗрдВ, рд╢реНрд░реЗрд╖реНрда рд╡рд╣реА рдЬреЛ рдШрд┐рд░рд╛ рдирд╣реАрдВ рд╣реЛ рд╖рдгрд┐рдХ рдирд┐рд░рд╛рд╢рд╛ рдореЗрдВ|
рдЬрд╛рдЧреЛ рдЬрдЧрд╛рдУ, рдорди рдордд рдмрд╣рд▓рд╛рдУ, рдПрдХ рдорд╕реАрд╣рд╛ рддреБрдо рднреА рдмрди рдЬрд╛рдУ |