Nehru, Indira and Lok Pal
I am reminded of a particular letter written to very young Indira by her doting father Nehru, specifically advising her not to do or say some thing ( concerning others) away from public view, if she cannot do the same thing in public.
Verbatim I do not recollect but the spirit is what I recollect.
Somehow that advice stuck in my mind which guided me in my years of public service.
So long as public servants and Ministers are allowed to act in secrecy in affairs relating to public, their weaknesses in character , seduce them to compromise public interests.
We have to give credit to their superior intelligence and street smartness and spirit to succeed at any cost, but once we remove the layer of secrecy and all their acts are subject to public scrutiny within 24 hours of their final decision on file, starting from at least three levels noting prior to decision making, we will see a sea-change in government's working.
An honest officer will finally get credit in service and manipulators will find it hard to make a killing.
The Ministers will have to act true to what they publicly say. This kernel of open governance will have a cascading effect in our society. Actually incentive to become Minister drops and really service oriented efficient persons will opt to become Ministers.
Once political class at the top are good, the bureaucracy will have incentives to steadily improve our systems.
Well.... instead we are busy with making some laws and creating additional parallel posts and worry about laying down their interplay rules.
Identify the problem correctly and apply the right solution.
The dark forces which excel in secrecy seems to be winning. The Lok Pal will be a non-starter. The guy will get some swanky offices and creature comforts but not many cases to handle that too in proper judicial manner. The law will make it difficult to prosecute.
Probably he will again depend on the same CBI unless they create another army of independent investigators!!!
With CVC, CAG, CBI and weak corrupt political bosses, quite a large number of officers down the line have stopped taking decisions for fear of victimisation.
Now we can add LOk Pal too....Only media will get exciting bytes and TRPs but I expect no improvement in governance.
Verbatim I do not recollect but the spirit is what I recollect.
Somehow that advice stuck in my mind which guided me in my years of public service.
So long as public servants and Ministers are allowed to act in secrecy in affairs relating to public, their weaknesses in character , seduce them to compromise public interests.
We have to give credit to their superior intelligence and street smartness and spirit to succeed at any cost, but once we remove the layer of secrecy and all their acts are subject to public scrutiny within 24 hours of their final decision on file, starting from at least three levels noting prior to decision making, we will see a sea-change in government's working.
An honest officer will finally get credit in service and manipulators will find it hard to make a killing.
The Ministers will have to act true to what they publicly say. This kernel of open governance will have a cascading effect in our society. Actually incentive to become Minister drops and really service oriented efficient persons will opt to become Ministers.
Once political class at the top are good, the bureaucracy will have incentives to steadily improve our systems.
Well.... instead we are busy with making some laws and creating additional parallel posts and worry about laying down their interplay rules.
Identify the problem correctly and apply the right solution.
The dark forces which excel in secrecy seems to be winning. The Lok Pal will be a non-starter. The guy will get some swanky offices and creature comforts but not many cases to handle that too in proper judicial manner. The law will make it difficult to prosecute.
Probably he will again depend on the same CBI unless they create another army of independent investigators!!!
With CVC, CAG, CBI and weak corrupt political bosses, quite a large number of officers down the line have stopped taking decisions for fear of victimisation.
Now we can add LOk Pal too....Only media will get exciting bytes and TRPs but I expect no improvement in governance.
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