Source: theprint.in
New Delhi: The Modi government’s plan to reform the civil service by laterally recruiting scores of domain experts has alarmed civil servants.
The Modi government had in its first term recruited nine joint secretaries from the private sector on a pilot basis. After returning to power with a thumping majority last month, it wants to recruit larger numbers of domain experts at the director and deputy secretary level.
The government has already begun working on the proposal which was part of the 100-day plan prepared by the Department of Personnel and Training.
While it is not clear when the modalities of the proposal — such as who will recruit these officers, what exactly will be their terms of recruitment etc. — will be fleshed out, the plan itself has led to serious concerns among serving civil servants.
The following are the five key concerns of civil servants, a wide cross-section of who spoke to ThePrint on the condition of anonymity to be able to express themselves freely.
What about us?
The move is bound to have a demoralising effect on serving civil servants who join the service at a young age of 24-25 and continue to work in the government for their entire career hoping to climb the ladder with time, say officers.
“Suddenly, you say that you guys continue to work at the lower levels, but for the higher ones, we will hire people from the private sector… It’s not fair,” said a director-level officer working in the central government.
“If you want lateral entry, then allow lateral exits also,” said another senior IAS officer.
“These lateral entrants are going to go back into the private sector with more leverage after working in the government… But existing officers can’t go anywhere — you are taking their domain away from them, and not allowing them to explore other options,” the officer added.
Former Union secretary Anil Swarup said civil servants may not be experts, but have leadership qualities. “You can outsource expertise but not leadership.”
Fewer government jobs
If the government’s proposal of recruiting hundreds of individuals via lateral entry comes through, the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) will have to hire fewer people, an official from the commission said.
“Logically speaking, we will have to hire fewer people if the proposal comes through… Otherwise it would only mean that we take more people and their growth gets arrested at higher stages,” the UPSC official said.
This would mean fewer prestigious government jobs since five-year contracts cannot be called full-fledged government jobs, said the IAS officer quoted above.
“Domain experts don’t really need jobs… So by giving them contracts for a few years, you’re not ensuring employment,” the officer said.
Reservation
While it is unclear if the government will give reservation to officers recruited through lateral entry, even if it does, it would be extremely difficult to find successful individuals from the reserved communities in the private sector at senior posts, said a Dalit IAS officer.
“The private sector has never had reservation and therefore, people from underprivileged communities hardly ever make it big there… So how is the government going to find domain experts from underprivileged groups?” the senior officer said.
Of the nine laterally recruited domain experts by UPSC this year, none belonged to the SC/ST communities, the officer pointed out.
Moreover, the Modi government’s own quota for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) will be rendered “un-implementable”, he added.
“Which domain expert will you find in the private sector who belongs to the EWS category?”
Accountability
If the government goes through with its plans, it must chalk out a foolproof method to ensure accountability of these domain experts even after the end of their contracts, said another IAS official.
“We remain accountable to the government throughout our careers because the government is our karta-dharta (whole and soul),” the official said.
“How will you ensure the same degree of accountability from someone who is simply going to walk back into a well-paying private job after five years?”
There is no cooling-off period that has been stipulated for the nine laterally recruited individuals for the post of joint secretaries. Even the 54 domain experts to be hired by Niti Aayog are not going to have a cooling-off period.
Swarup too agreed that accountability will be a major issue.
“As civil servants, we take an oath to the constitution…if something goes wrong, we’re held liable. How do you fix responsibility here?” he asked.
What about specialised services?
The criticism of being “generalists” may hold true for the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), but officers from other services like the forest, revenue, telecom, etc. believe that they are domain experts, who have been neglected at the cost of the IAS.
“If the government is taking such a radical step, it might as well stop recruiting officers from specialised services altogether,” said an IFS officer.
“For so long, we are neglected because our expertise is apparently too limited, and then suddenly we are told we need domain expertise, but we’ll bring it from outside… It doesn’t quite add up.”
