New civil service entrants consider tenure in govt as an opportunity of self-aggrandisement

Chennai:

Has the quality of Indian Civil Service cadre, which serves as a
backbone of the nation, deteriorated? Former civil servants think so.

At a event to mark the 139th Birth Anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai
Patel here organised by The Triplicane Cultural Academy, former CBI
director R K Raghavan said that though it is preposterous to attempt
any comparison on the performance of civil services of yesteryears and
today, it is sad that sad but true that some of the new entrants look
upon a tenure in government as an opportunity of self-aggrandisement.

He said that civil services are a tool, a means to an end rather than
the end itself. “It is distressing to see that many new entrants do
not look upon this as an opportunity to serve the poor and
downtrodden,” Raghavan said.

Raghavan said that he began his career where police had a much higher
level of acceptability. “They were feared by the underworld and
respected by the law abiding citizen. Present events give a feeling
that it has changed,” he said.

“Big question mark have been raised over the police capacity to help
common man and over the standards of integrity at all levels within
police force,” he said.

Former director general of police A X Alexander highlighted how the
state police force underwent changes. “When I joined there was only
one Inspector general of police, who was the head of the force. When I
reported there were only 70 IPS officers but now we have 263 IPS
officers,” Aexander said.

“When I joined, the department was efficiently handled in a
pyramidical structure and a sound control. Today with the expansion of
the force, the pyramidical structure has crumbled and cylindrical
structure has evolved where responsibility of individual officer is
not well-defined, where discipline is collapsing and service to
society is dissipated,” he said.

He also said that on one hand the government is doing away with old
and archaic laws, but it is also adding new new laws which demand the
police services to enforce. “They are on filmsy matters which can be
very well looked after by existing laws itsef,” he said.

“These new laws add to the workload of the officers and deviate them
from their main duties of maintaining law and order, preventing and
detecting crimes,” the former police officer said.

Former Ministry of External Affairs (West) secretary M Ganapathy said
that envoys of yesteryears were messengers of prime minister and
focussed more on political issues and geo-politics. “Now the diplomacy
is more focussed on economy,” he said. He said the corruption is
minimal in foreign services except at passport offices.

Former governor of West Bengal Gopalkrishna Gandhi chose to distance
himself about the issue and focussed on the contribution of Sardar
Patel. He said there were differences between Sardar Patel and
Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister. “But such differences
did not come in the way of mutual trust,” he said.