The Immoral India......

'THE IMMORAL INDIA'-What is the way ahead?

The symptoms were there for all to see. In one generation, i.e. from about 1970 till the turn of the century we witnessed historic if not paradigm changes in the Indian society. In the early Years of independence, conservative living with bare minimum creature comforts had disciplined most Indians to live within their means. Even the rich and well to do opted for Spartan life styles. From telephones to motor vehicles were considered to be luxuries of life which few could afford.

Then came the change. Destruction of institutions, which had been carefully created and nurtured. Political arrogance born out of a combination of dynastic politics and a suppressed people. Invasion of Television into the drawing rooms, liberalization of the economy, cable TV/Bollywood and the inevitable thrust towards consumerism. All this led to increasing trust deficit between the people and the Government. Social media began to empower a section of our society. The  power of ICT and its impact on moral and religious values were yet to be comprehended.

Poor infrastructure, induction of criminals with money and muscle power into legislative  and migration of rural population to urban centre coincided with another event. Empowering the socially isolated segments of society and the emergence of the nouveau riche.

Poor quality of political leadership led to crony capitalism, as that was an option for entrepreneurs and successful politicians to prosper. There were no level playing fields.

The fast lanes of urban life destroyed traditional joint family patterns leading to nuclear families. There was no one at home to illumine and stimulate impressionable minds on Indian epics and their lessons. Demographically, all this could not have happened at a worse time when India was leaderless and the density of population in cities continued its upward journey(likely to continue at least till 2030.)Given that, poorly governed city administration refuses to restructure and professionalize tools of governance, it only meant that we will witness the slow death of our Metropolitan cities.

How then can India regain her civilizational and cultural integrity? From a nation which claimed to be the epitome of  moral values, we have degenerated to an in disciplined, mindless ,valueless, insensitive and an aggressive people. Rapes and dead bodies do not move us unless it is so gruesome that it temporarily stuns us. Single issues can at best stimulate minds for a while. Palliative measures have to give way to prophylactic ones. The latter has to start with good politics, good economics, which in turn would hopefully result in adequate resources to address education, health, infrastructure, industry and all other essential segments that could and would restore the dignity of India. How would that come about?

A ray of hope. The middle class has begun to participate in demanding good governance. The middle class is growing rapidly and they inhabit urban centres. From the very inception, PPI has sought to mobilize this segment of our population in order to make some impact on the decision making mechanism that resides in the Parliament.

Getting good people into parliament and ensuring that their primary focus is on amending/creating laws and legislation that contribute to good governance, is the cornerstone of our strategy.

Anna and 'Nirbhaya', the 23 year old brave heart, might have just ignited the fire to awaken the middle class. It bodes well for 2013. Happy new year.

JAI HIND

  

Agitational Politics-we need long pending reforms

The years 2011-2012 have seen aggrieved citizens pouring out on the streets of their respective countries to protest and to register their dissonance with Political inaction. In Libya and Egypt and the ongoing civil war in Syria for their freedom from autocratic regimes and in India, to fight corruption, poor governance and anti-people policies of a democratically elected Government.

Anna,Khejriwal and  Ramdev have tried and are still trying to channelize the anger of the people by using their respective models. What do progressive and well meaning parties like PPI do to ameliorate the citizen's plight? By now it would be clear to all, that there are no quick fix solutions and that palliative measures are but temporary solutions to systemic weaknesses that need prophylactic actions.

Electoral reforms have been suggested by many eminent members of Election Commissions. If they were to be accepted many of our representatives would be disqualified. Police reforms were proposed by a retired senior police officer but remain unactioned by our elected legislators, despite directions of the Supreme Court. Judicial reforms are long overdue along with augmentation of infrastructure. But, the process of reforms are painfully slow.

To conceive and implement reforms you need qualified Legislators. Criminals in Parliament and  state Assemblies are not the right  representatives of the people. You cannot have unproductive Parliamentary sessions when so many critical bills are pending to be debated and passed.

Single issues are therefore not the solution to our dilemma. They will merely  bring millions on the streets. If electoral reforms, police reforms and judicial reforms are not addressed and  implemented on time, it is more than likely that the next single issue may turn violent enough to cause destruction and death, which is totally avoidable at this juncture of our history.

We all are aware of the problems but we need solutions to prevent regressive politics. You have to come out and vote for clean and good people who enter politics. Politics cannot be shunned as most of you are inclined to do.

Like minded and progressive parties are coming together to launch a consortium and to share scarce resources needed to reach out to you. All we need is an assurance that you will exercise your franchise to ensure that good people occupy the seats of Parliament and legislative Assemblies of this Country.

Jai Hind

Are Civil Servants Accountable?

            GOOD GOVERNANCE-ARE CIVIL SERVANTS ACCOUNTABLE?

India is certainly at cross roads. When the country needs the most capable Ministers and a very professional bunch of civil servants to realize her true potential, we appear to be running aground on all fronts. We adopted the Westminster model along with the infamous White Hall system from the British. The British, from time to time, have tried to reform the structure of administration and decision making;  with little success thus far.

Our own efforts to reform the administration has addressed some components, including the induction and training pattern of our Civil Services; paradoxically called the Steel Frame of India. The steel in it has virtually disappeared while the frame keeps expanding horizontally and vertically. The more it expands, the more hollow it becomes.

The system that we inherited from the British was sound ,adequate then to meet our needs and it was perhaps assumed that administrative  reforms would follow even as we grew.  However, the British system was predicated upon certain axioms- that the politician would be driven by short term and selfish pressures and that common good of the people or public interest may not always be his objective.

The Civil Servant was to remain apolitical or politically neutral with a high degree of pecuniary and moral integrity. More importantly,  he was not to be motivated by the desire to make money .Integrity honesty ,objectivity and impartiality were to be his guiding principles. These checks and balances were meant to keep the system on a straight and narrow path, solely to defend the interest of the common man. The entire administrative apparatus was to ensure that they focus on the common good or public interest, which in turn would send out a powerful message that the Government was always right.

As happened in other democracies, with changing aspirations of the people, the fundamentals on which this edifice was built began to cave in. The British model saw an increasing convergence of interest between the greedy politician and the pliant Civil Servant. The latter may not have always had his hand in the till but often chose to remain silent or look the other way just to survive. This was captured powerfully and euphemistically in the famous BBC serial, "Yes Minister' and "Yes Prime Minister". Reportedly, Maggie Thatcher, often called the Iron Lady of UK, was assertive but patient in execution of programmes, which allowed space for the Civil Servant to adhere to established norms. More recently, the  Tony Blair-Sir Robin Butler controversy and David Cameron--Sir Guss O'Donnel- episode, when the Civil servant chose to remain, assertive or silent respectively, are good examples. These exemplify the nature of conflict between the desire of the Politician to push his programmes and the duty of the Civil Servant to protect public interest. In the Indian context, particularly in the State Governments there are scores of incidents in which Civil Servants chose to turn a blind eye to the wrong doings of their Political Masters. Worse, they were  willing consorts.

The existing decision making process in India, is based on files that move from the lowest rung of the ladder ,vertically within departments and thereafter horizontally to gather views of other departments. This system is open to manipulation. Decisions can be delayed or expedited on the pretext of awaiting return of files to the originator. Internal dissensions or disagreements can be overcome by arm twisting the dissenter to change his noting as if it is his own, so the superior with mala fide intentions, is seen to be  in agreement with the wisdom of the department. There are numerous loop holes waiting to be exploited. What is worse, a scrutiny of files by investigators/auditors in most cases cannot establish any accountability of individuals in a chain, due to subversion of the process in use.

Attempts have been made by some wings of the Government, both at the centre and State, to reform the process through Management Information System(MIS). The essentials of file work, especially its integrity depends on ensuring that the basic principles of promoting and accepting contrary views are valued and protected. Insufficient understanding of value of professional discussions and hasty introduction of E- governance with emphasis only on tracking of files without equal emphasis on contents, may damage the decision making process even more.

The Indian scene is well known. Those of us who have seen the degeneration of administration over six decades and the compelling desire of the Civil Servant to either share the booty or just survive, know the root causes. Money and muscle power continue to play an important role in the electoral process of India. Efforts made by successive CECs to cleanse the system through legislation for electoral reforms, remain unattended due to lack of will of Governments of the day. Thanks to more assertive citizens, a less deferential media and freedom of information, the scene has begun to change ,albeit, rather slowly.

Given the above scenario, on one hand, though paradoxically ,the interest of the citizen(who refuses to vote due to apathy) and those of enlightened politicians who are smart enough to sense the mood of the country, are bound to converge . On the other, economic reforms have the potential of resulting in chaotic administration. The Administration, if not reformed to meet the complex  challenges of a knowledge based society, would lead to more chaos and not less. The civil servant of today, cannot assume to be part of a vibrant democracy unless the process of selection, grooming and lateral induction to fill the gap in vertical specialization  is addressed as an inextricable part of good administration. Without that good governance would remain a distant dream.

Judge for yourself, is Administrative Reforms( with radical changes) any less important than Economic Reforms?