Significance
of Durga Shakti: A turning point for better governance?
Rajivan Krishnaswamy
Various social organisations and trade unions
organise a candle light protest against the suspension of IAS officer Durga
Shakti Nagpal in Lucknow.
In the wake of the Durga Shakti Nagpal controversy which hit
headlines, former senior bureaucrat Dr. Rajivan Krishnaswamy raises an
important question about whether the public outrage over the young IAS
officer’s case reflects accumulated anger over "the state of public
goods". He also asks whether the Durga Nagpal case can be a trend-changer
resulting in a serious debate on genuine governance reform.
Now that the immediate news value of Durga Shakti Nagpal’s
dramatic suspension and media aftermath is behind us, it is perhaps time to
reflect upon the significance of the event for the politician-civil servant
relationship and speculate on future prospects for clean governance in India,
governance that protects and promotes public good. Three questions are explored
here:
One, is the faceoff between Nagpal on the one hand, and the
Samajwadi Party (SP) with the sand mafia on the other, just a case of a local
conflict between politically-backed vested interests and an honest civil
servant simply doing her job? Is a conflict, though painful for the civil
servant, part of the occupational hazards of regulatory work in democracies? Or
is it a symptom of a deeper malaise, reflecting a trend that is worsening and
hence in need of social policy action?
Two, to what extent is it an issue of the Indian Administrative
Service (IAS) versus other civil services? Recall that the SP has been highly
vocal in saying that the State of Uttar Pradesh (UP) does not need any IAS
officers at all, implying that they can run the administration better with
officials fully under state control.
Three, what are the prospects for the future of governance in
India? Does the intense public debate and open protest in Nagpal’s case suggest
that cases of victimization of civil servants would decline in the future as
public scrutiny can embarrass political leadership? Or would it embolden
similar acts elsewhere, especially as she continues to be suspended, her
husband transferred without cause, leaving the field wide open for even more
blatant acts?
Episodes or trends?
When the number of individual instances of corruption become so
numerous and pervasive, it is hard to dismiss them as episodic occurrences.
They may be better characterised as trends. Dispassionate observers of the
politician-civil servant relationship over the last 50 years would agree about
two interrelated developments that point to a deeper malaise seen at all levels
of government, but especially at the Central and State levels:
• The rising collusion between the three groups – political
leaders, business interests and civil servants – in pursuing short-term gains
even if it involves stealing public wealth directly, or harming the general
public good.
• An increasing intolerance within government by the political and
civil servant bosses towards the honest civil servant, skewing incentives, in
turn, contributing to lowered standards of probity and progressive undermining
of the greater common good.
There is the
grand corruption of large contracts that divert public money to further
immediate private interests at the cost of the public good... In public
procurement deals of huge commercial value, collusion can operate… A smart
collusion ensures that only “cooperative” personnel are lined up along the
progress of the file to eliminate potential disruptions. But when this is not
done in advance and a civil servant becomes un-cooperative, s/he is sidelined,
and in more blatant cases, disciplinary or even criminal proceedings initiated.
Honesty is rebuffed repeatedly, and normal query on file calling for more
information or seeking clear orders starts to look odd and becomes the subject
of much corridor discussion. 
Assets with characteristics of “public” wealth such as the technology-based
spectrum or a natural resource like coal, that have very high commercial
values, are examples in recent times where large losses through policy have
been alleged at the central level. At the State level too, licensing of mineral
extraction, such as granite, for real estate involve collusive policy actions
that have compromised public wealth. Such acts undermine future public
revenues, apart from the inevitable environmental damage. These conspiracies
cannot have occurred without tripartite connivance. When regulations themselves
are fixed, such acts can even be perfectly legal but perfectly corrupt. They
take on the nature of the very capture of the state.
Then there is the grand corruption of large contracts that divert
public money to further immediate private interests at the cost of the public
good. In public procurement deals of huge commercial value like defence at the
centre, or excise regimes that favour cartels and even mass schemes needing
repeated contracts like universal feeding at the State level, once again
collusion can operate. Either the civil servant would initiate a patently
absurd procurement or auction, or if the civil servant opposes such an act, the
political boss has the confidence to find someone else that can do what is needed.
A smart collusion ensures that only “cooperative” personnel are lined up along
the progress of the file to eliminate potential disruptions. But when this is
not done in advance and a civil servant becomes un-cooperative, s/he is
sidelined, and in more blatant cases, disciplinary or even criminal proceedings
initiated.
Since these acts have increased over time, and honesty rebuffed
repeatedly, personal and professional costs to the honest civil servant
increase at the margin. A normal query on file calling for more information or
seeking clear orders starts to look odd and becomes the subject of much
corridor discussion. The officer becomes mentally prepared to be, at the very
least, summarily shifted from the post. The situation of Ashok Khemka appears
to be a case in point – the officer, irrespective of the political party in
power, has had an average tenure of six months over a career of three decades.
When the lesson from each case of conflict is that honesty is costly, normal
probity and resistance to corruption tend to decline.
In contrast with national and State levels, municipal and
panchayat level politicians have yet to be delegated with powers to allocate
public wealth, and local level bureaucracies have limited policy space. Not
that corruption is absent, but typically, the money value is low. Examples such
as a village administrative officer suspended for demanding a tip for a
certificate, a forest ranger caught for ignoring illegal tree cutting, a block
development officer charged for siphoning off part of a subsidy in a
micro-credit scheme or a school teacher dismissed for demanding payments for
grades, do find their way into local papers. As a matter of course, lower end
government employees are more easily charged for acts of relatively petty
corruption. Most multilateral assisted projects too, ironically, focus on the
local levels for improving “governance” (euphemism for anti-corruption in
development literature). The implicit assumption is that corruption decreases
at higher levels of government – with no basis in experience. Sure, the local
focus could also be because that is where the visible part of development
projects is located, but could also be a convenient façade due to hesitation in
confronting the client at the top.
The positive actions in running governance programmes through
multilateral loans, and the punitive actions in catching the lowly serve to
deflect attention from the more serious convivial relationship between the
politician-businessman-official at higher levels of government. And the focus
on petty, rat-like acts at lower levels deflects from serious dacoit-style acts
of grand corruption and the less visible, insidious state capture at higher
levels. It blinds us all to the old proverb that a fish usually rots from the
head down.
The expenses for
political success have been rising while the tenure of office is short and
hence the need to recoup as soon as possible. Civil servants, on the other
hand, have low financial costs for entry and a longer tenure than politicians,
often with a pension for life including for a surviving spouse. Hence officials
need to be undermined in other ways – transfers, suspensions, charges – to make
them toe the line, with public good becoming a contested space.
There have been several explanations for the rising
misappropriation of public good through this nexus or for the
official-politician conflict that sometimes comes in the way. A popular
explanation runs as follows: the expenses for political success have been
rising (it is rumoured that to win a parliamentary seat costs around Rs. 3
crores) while the tenure of office is short (five years) and hence the need to
recoup as soon as possible. Civil servants, on the other hand, have low
financial costs for entry (cheapest in money terms for the highest category of
the IAS as the UPSC recruitments are beyond reproach, even though they cost
more in terms of earnings lost in preparation time and the intense effort in
competitive entry) and a longer tenure than politicians – at least thirty years
– often with a pension for life including for a surviving spouse. Hence
officials need to be undermined in other ways – transfers, suspensions, charges
– to make them toe the line, with public good becoming a contested space. Advocates
of strengthening all the civil services are probably motivated by institutional
arrangements that insulate officials from pressures, to serve as barriers to
rapid exploitation of public wealth. Unfortunately, counter examples abound, of
officials acting with impunity and even guiding their political bosses through
the intricacies of procedural requirements for legally diverting public wealth.
After the dismantling of the license raj in 1991, and the opening
of the production of public goods like power and roads to the private sector,
the opportunities for policy-based corruption declined. Advocates for further
cuts in the public investments would like to reduce the scope for both the
civil servant and the politician in making investment decisions. But there is
little evidence to support this presumption – most acts of privatisation
(starting from the disinvestment scandals in the 1990s), Enron and power, coal
etc., have led to considerable losses. In fact, liberalisation itself, throws
up more opportunities for conversion of public goods into private profits
through bad policy.
IAS versus the rest: Debunking a red herring
We now look squarely at the question of the extent to which it is
an issue of the IAS versus other civil services. The fact that Durga Shakti
Nagpal is an IAS officer, has led the arguments in a potential red herring
direction on the IAS itself – diverting from the core issue of misappropriation
of public wealth. Note that the district mining officer was also summarily
transferred but, without Nagpal, his case would not have received as much
attention.
At one extreme, the SP that has stated it does not need IAS
officers at all – meaning they do not want officials that do not do as bid. At
the other extreme, and on the same basis, is the view that the IAS is the best
hope for the protection of public good – a former Cabinet Secretary has argued
that the IAS should be strengthened by policy actions such as fixed tenure etc.
Both these positions are based on flawed premises. The SP argument presupposes
that Nagpal did what she did because she was an IAS officer and the opposite
camp that argues for strengthening the IAS, also lays great store by
strengthened civil services. It is difficult to argue that she went after the
sand mafia because she was an IAS officer. The non-IAS, District Mining Officer
(also suddenly transferred) also seems to have been doing an excellent job. It
is also unlikely that had Nagpal been from the state civil services she would
have acted differently. There are innumerable instances of non-IAS officers who
have upheld public interest against serious odds and equally significant number
of IAS officers conniving in eroding of public interest (including a former
chief secretary level officer from UP who had been found guilty in land scams).
Therefore, the argument for strengthening the IAS through fixed tenures based
on this case is weak. If anything, it would apply to all services.
On the other hand, the SP argument that an all India service like
the IAS (with dual control of State and Central governments) is a hindrance to
effective state government performance is equally weak. It presumes that
non-IAS officers do not enter into conflicts with politicians as they are fully
under state control. This too appears incorrect from the example of the
district mining officer and from the example of the UP Chief Secretary (the
head of the IAS) in suspending Nagpal without application of mind. And the dual
control argument – allowing central government protection for Nagpal from
arbitrary actions such as suspension in minutes – has proven to be no
protection after all. The central government, and the department of personnel
that has the powers to revoke the suspension, itself headed by an IAS officer,
directly under the country’s Prime Minister, has remained silent. This, despite
the Prime Minister as the departmental minister having been tasked by his party
president to ensure justice was done. It would be interesting to document the
discussions among the civil servants who actively participated in suspending
Nagpal in UP and among those in Delhi who have the power to revoke but remain
passive by not exercising that power. What exactly are they advising their
political masters on the ramifications of this case?
Practical considerations would suggest that Nagpal, with hardly
two years of work experience, and likely to spend another 30 years in UP, would
be ill-advised to complain. Even if her suspension is revoked, she would be
marked for life as “difficult” and probably end up with a career profile
similar to that of Ashok Khemka. So for the SP to blame the IAS or the issue of
dual control as the cause of the fiasco is unjustified.
However, some governments run by strong regional parties may be
sympathetic to the view that the IAS has no special role, and its all-India
status provides no value addition for the ruling government of the day. In
Tamilnadu, for example, chief ministers have consistently held that directly
recruited IAS officers are neither special, nor do they add value. Further they
have through actions such as refusal to send these officers on central
deputation, illegal suspension before voluntary retirement, cocked a snook at
the central government and the associated notion of dual control. Nevertheless
IAS officers have held key positions even with strong regional parties that are
confident about their political strength and hence longer staying power – again
showing that the issue is not IAS versus the rest as the SP has tried to pitch
it.
60 years ago
Sardar Patel argued that an all India Service was necessary to integrate a
highly diverse country through good and unified governance after centuries of
colonial rule and fragmented governance standards... But now, an objective
assessment of the IAS would show that it has protected public good but also
connived to erode it.
The argument that the IAS is archaic and not relevant for today’s
governance needs is, however, a more serious one – though for reasons different
from those advanced by the SP. The sentiment behind creating the IAS is best
summarised by Sardar Patel’s arguments in the Constituent Assembly debates.
Patel argued that an all India Service was necessary to integrate a highly
diverse country through good and unified governance after centuries of colonial
rule and fragmented governance standards. Further, these objectives were to be
achieved by a composition of IAS officers in states consisting of a ratio of
insiders-outsiders selected through high entrance requirements. This system
(the steel frame) was designed with the expectation that it would be less
biased, prone to corruption and local influences. It would enable them to
implement the union laws on the ground fairly uniformly, combined with their
knowledge of local issues from establishing state cadres.
Now, around 60 years later, an objective assessment of the IAS
with reference to these initial expectations would perhaps show mixed results.
As argued earlier, the IAS has both protected public good but also connived to
erode it. While the need for an all India policy and implementation framework
for national public goods would probably justify the Indian Forest Service, the
Indian Foreign Service, the Income Tax, Customs, Defence, and may be even the
Police, it is not clear what national and integrating value the IAS brings to
citizens. Further, if we take a random sample of IAS officers and stratify on
the basis of caste, gender, region or class, and examine whether probity has an
association with any of these attributes, one would not find any significant
correlation, demonstrating that values such as probity in governance cannot be
generated by designing ratios of insider/outsider or dual controls.
Are we at an inflection point?
We now turn to the issue of prospects for the future of governance
in India. Could the Durga Shakti Nagpal case be a trend changer that results in
serious debate on genuine governance reform? Would victimization of honest
officials decline in the face of political embarrassment from growing public
scrutiny? Or does this case reinforce a trend that emboldens more such acts?
The prospects for change could potentially come from three sources: the
bureaucracy itself, the political class, or the rising tide of civil society
movements that are angrier and increasingly emboldened.
The reaction of the bureaucracy to the Nagpal episode could be,
“Yes, this is what happens when you are young, you get hit, and there is no one
to protect you, so next time walk away from confrontations; there are several
sand mines but only one career.” This reaction type would reinforce the
collusive trends and boost misappropriation. If the past is an efficient
predictor, then the former reaction would, over time, subsume the latter. On
the other hand, if this case is seen as a wakeup call, and energises all civil
services (for example, several IAS associations have come forward to condemn
the suspension) then the prospects for systemic reform improve.
The prospect for change from the political leadership is difficult
to predict. Electoral democracies do not come cheap. The temptations for quick
money and competitive compulsions of elections provide a fertile ground for
collusion with business interests that not only generate money, but also
benefit from policies and contracts. Hardly any democracy has found a foolproof
solution to election funding. The significant positive signal of Sonia Gandhi
in taking up the case has been dampened by the Manmohan Singh response asking
first for a letter from the aggrieved official to do justice. Unlike on most
other issues (food security, water sharing, Telangana or Bodoland) there is
unanimity across political parties on amending the Right to Information Act to
exclude them from having to share information. Yet, it can hardly be said that
all political leaders are corrupt – in the past political movements have been
motivated explicitly by social good. Moreover, in the game of electoral musical
chairs, political strategy may lead to a realisation that it is better to
support clean systems which do not work to their disadvantage when out of
power. Political maturity may well lie in responding to people’s expectations
in the times of hyper exposure in the media.
The big unknown
is the effect of the Durga Shakti Nagpal case on civil society. Over the years
more and more sections of the civil society have accumulated anger against a
corrupt system... The widespread disaffection is not only with acts of
corruption but with the state of public goods… This anger, though sporadic and
dispersed, is real. It may embed in it the kernel of a chance to change the
status quo.
The big unknown is the effect of the Durga Shakti Nagpal case on
civil society. Over the years more and more sections of the civil society – as
individual and as groups – have accumulated anger against a corrupt system.
While “letterhead” CSOs do have questionable reputations, some of the
collective action movements have shown remarkable staying power and an ability
to channel public anger. The widespread disaffection is not only with acts of
corruption but with the state of public goods, often expressed petulantly as
“why should I pay taxes from my hard earned money for this corrupt
neta-business-babu nexus to spend?” This anger, though sporadic and dispersed,
is real. It may embed in it the kernel of a chance to change the status quo. A
catalysing agent may be the new media which make collective action far easier.
It can amplify voice and visibility at very low cost in terms of money, time or
effort. A small voice can leverage disproportionate power through extraordinary
and instant visibility.
Time will tell whether India is at a turning point – whether
people’s pressure from below will join hands with political maturity from
above. The civil service usually complies.
(Rajivan Krishnaswamy has a Masters and PhD in Economics from the
University of Southern California, Los Angeles. He has worked in the IAS, at
various levels, starting from city level administration to the prime ministers
office. He was the CEO and MD of the Tamilnadu Urban Development Fund
(1996-2003), after which he worked as Senior Urban Finance Specialist at the
World Bank in Washington. Currently he is an independent consultant based in
Chennai, working in China, Vietnam and Ghana.)
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