Tuesday, February 02, 2010

Be imaginative and creative: PM’s yet another prescription for Indian bureaucrats

IN AN apparent move to make Indian administration results oriented, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh has asked the bureaucrats to be much more creative and imaginative. While addressing the first annual conference of chief secretaries in New Delhi on Monday, Mr Singh said the administrative apparatus would be able to match the demanding test of time only if it is innovative, flexible and quick.
“It also requires that everyone in the administrative system is well informed, well trained and well equipped to tackle the tasks before him or her; to think not only of what we face today but what is likely to be encountered in the years ahead,” he said. He further added that governance now had become an extremely complex process, and the rising expectations of the people make them impatient with the speed at which results are delivered. “People today resent apathy, sloth, and corruption in any form and at any level of government more than ever before. There is clamour for accountability from all quarters – the legislature, the judiciary and the media,” he added. Prime Minister complimented the cabinet secretary KM Chandrasekhar for taking the initiative of proposing the conference.
Meanwhile, minister of state for personnel, public grievances and pensions, Prithviraj Chauhan in his address expressed concern over the drastic reduction of the number of All India Service officers deputed at the deputy secretary and director level to Centre during the recent years. He said that states or Union Territories should sponsor more officers for central deputation as they being with them the practical field experience, and in turn they are enriched by their exposure to policy making at the Central level.
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Administrators of 25 districts selected for MGNREGA awards
The government has selected top administrators of 25 districts in the country for the prestigious award of excellence in MGNREGA administration for 2008-09. Some of those officers who would receive the award in New Delhi on February 2, 2010, include M Ravinchandra, Chiroor district, AP, Mukesh Kumar Meena, Kurnool district of AP, Sonmoni Borah, Raipur district, Chhatisgarh, MS Paraste, Bastar district Chhattisgarh, Mohammad Shayin, Ambala distrcit, Haryana, RS Gupta, Kangra district, Himachal Pradesh, Dr Manish Ranjan, Deogarh district Jharkahnd, Ashok Kumar Singh, Idukki district, Kerala, Dr J Ravi Shankar, Belgaum district, Karnataka, Dr PC Jafar, Gulbarga district, Karnataka and Gulshan Bamra, Balaghat district, MP to name a few.
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Action and Appointments
a) RK Bhatia, a 1974 batch UP cadre IPS has been appointed as Director General of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP).
b) Vikram Srivastava, a 1973 batch UP cadre IPS has been appointed as Director General of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).
c) Sunil Mitra joins on Monday as the revenue secretary in finance ministry.
d) The IPS (Pay) rules were amended to make mid career training mandatory for promotion of IPS officers holding the ranks of SP, DIG and IG. The duration of the course will be 8 weeks, 8 weeks and 4 weeks, respectively, for the three ranks. The first batch under the new Scheme will undergo training in 2010. 

4 comments:

  1. The poor Doctor (Dr. Manmohan Singh) is prescribing an advice of “Creativity and Imagination” to the most corrupt bureaucracy in Asia. No heed is paid by the bureaucrats to such ill advises. How a Collector within less than a decade of service become Millionaire? How many of them and their own tribe men ever prosecuted for amassing wealth disproportionate to their sources of income? How could they be prosecuted, when their own tribe men are manning the position which would take cognizance of their ill deeds? They have been provided unquestioned access to the funds of government through schemes like NREGA.

    What moral high grounds this government can claim for propagation of such schemes where a good amount of funds are siphoned off by petty politicians in the village, block, Tehsil and District with active assistance of employee of state. A suave Manmohan, cleverly (like Shylock), is administering poisonous pills which would scavenge the last pore of flesh on the body and kill the poor and have-nots with hunger, illiteracy and helplessness. How would he feel if he is put in the place of a wage earner, earning Rs. 80 for 100 days when Dal(pulse) alone is sold at Rs.100 per Kg.? How would a poor wage earner would survive remaining 264 days (provided he lives)? Let’s forget his need for sending his wads to school and taking care of his own health and his own loved ones. Would the democracy flourish and ideals of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity and Justice become embedded deep by such shallow outlook. Perhaps that’s why, in the history of mankind, politicians are never Great men !

    The recipe being propagated by the present regime is a recipe of genocide, a recipe to kill the poor with whatever weapons (hunger, disease, illiteracy, helplessness) and create a havoc much worse than the Gas Chambers of Nazis.

    The ruling classes of this country has understood that Plebians of this country have risen up to higher levels on mere exposure to the education in a limited way in short span of time. Therefore, they are putting stumbling blocks and wasting money of exchequer on such foolish schemes like NREGS rather than investing in education and health care and fixing responsibility of state in disbursing to each citizen of this country.

    The initiatives like NREGS would create slaves and vote banks, no real empowerment of poor people. They big mass of people will die of hunger, disease and perhaps these are the intentions of ruling class of this country. The sycophancy has reached its pinnacle when they are disbursing awards for such a foolish and imprudent initiatives.

    Perhaps that is the WELFARENOMICS of Wise Doctor?

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  2. The picture is not so bleak-- try the simple act : india with nrega v/s india without nrega. flowery english alone cannot wish away the real positive changes brought about by such innovative schemes at the grass root. ofcourse, this is not to defend the blood sucking corrupt babus and the silent murder of the poorest by allowing the scaling of pulse prices as high as Rs.100. afterall, nrega was a product of the noble thought and initiative of grass root activists viz. jean dreze and others.

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  3. No doubt India is the second fastest growing economies in the world, but the process of development should be harmonious one and it should encompass the rural areas also.

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  4. Dear Editor,

    Thanks very much for hosting my views on your Blog. Let me comment on few points arose in the discussions subsequently;

    When the English flows from the pen of a poor and starving, it become flowery English and when it flows from the pen of a noble, rich and bourgeois, it becomes Victorian English. Yes, the picture is not bleak but rather dreadful, see what happened in U.P., where a scam of Rs. 800 Crores in NREGS has been reported today. What happened in Orissa two years back, where a scam of Rs.500 Crores was reported in NREGA. Same would hold good for almost all states where this scheme has been introduced. You need not go deep, just scratch the uppermost layer of skin and cancer of corruption, nepotism and favoritism would be visible. White collar criminality is going unpunished for far too long, resultantly, we see the magnitude of fraud becoming fatter and fatter in this country. Ruling class, capitalist, private enterprise, administration of state is in hand and glove in perpetuating injustice. Rule of Law is casualty in this land. So the observations are apt and to the point.

    It may be correct that we have conducted 15 General Elections in a row and this country and flatter ourselves to be vibrant democracy. The economy of this country is projected to grow at 8 or 9%, therefore, all is well, tantamount to living in fool’s paradise. Aldous Huxley remarked on the Taj Mahal that marble conceals a multitude of sins. Dynastic, Feudalistic, Casteist Democracy needs to dismantled and democracy based on the principles of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity and Justice needs to be build for keeping the hope and aspiration of people of this country alive.

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