The Nation: Government, Powerless in Power

As a journalist, Arun Shourie chewed up the government. Now as a minister he realises how difficult it is to bring about change in the system.

Arun Shourie was the one-man opposition in the 1980s, with his office of the editor at The Indian Express resembling a war headquarters. Under his captaincy the paper became a sort of daily trial court for the people in power -- his targets being Giani Zail Singh, Indira Gandhi, A.R. Antulay, Bhajan Lal, all political dinosaurs who roamed the field in that decade.

SHOURIESPEAK

ON BUREAUCRACY: "It is not a fact that nobody in the government works. An efficient monitoring system will ensure files do not keep moving for years, often within the same office and, at times, from desk to desk in the same office room."
ON PLANNING: "All Plan resources are in a sense borrowed funds. But at present the entity that spends the fund -- for instance, the individual state -- is so far removed from the borrowing that for it the funds are a costless resource. Why not 'disintermediate'? Why not have the states rated for their creditworthiness directly and independently?"
ON UNNECESSARY EXPENDITURE: "The Central Government owns several factories that have been closed for years. The government spends over Rs 1,000 crore every year on the wages for the workers of these factories."
ON PROJECT DELAYS: "Of 452 Central projects we have studied, 205 have been delayed. The delay ranges from one month to 189 months, or over 15 years. The two main causes of delay are lack of funds and land acquisition problems."
ON DOWNSIZING GOVERNMENT: "There is a need to look at the recruitment rules. The Planning Commission alone has 91 rules for recruitment. These are 91 silos within one silo."

When Shourie was inducted into the Union council of ministers by Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee last year, many were curious to see how Shourie would wield power after having crusaded against it for so long. The prime minister was perhaps cautious rather than curious, so he gave Shourie the charge of a host of high-sounding but academic departments: Planning, Administrative Reforms, Programme Implementation and Statistics. In such low-key departments too, he must keep his reformist zeal on a short leash. In an earlier meeting of the ministerial council, his colleagues forced him to withdraw a note on downsizing the government. Shourie has not wielded power in the real sense, but has a fine ringside view of how the Central administration really works. This view would not have been available to a journalist.

As a kind of prisoner of power, and using his famous skill at documenting the bizarre, Shourie, 59, is discovering the way the buck passes along the bureaucratic corridors, with pointless notings on files that moves in circles for months, if not years. The Department of Administrative Reforms (DAR) under him has divided itself into five groups to build chronologies of files -- with details like the dates, the names and designations of officers commenting on the subject, and the actions taken. The matrix has enabled the investigative-journalist-turned-minister to unravel a series of case studies in bureaucratic apple-polishing.

One such study of file pushing begins with a simple proposal: should Amar Singh, deputy adviser (DA) in the Programme Evaluation Organisation (PEO) of the Planning Commission, be allowed to attend a training course at the Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA) in Delhi? The file was opened on July 16, 1997.

On September 1, 1997, Adviser (Evaluation) S.P. Pal wrote to Joint Secretary (Training) A.K. Arora seeking the content of the training course. Arora was silent. On September 15, Pal wrote on the file that he had discussed the matter with the then member (evaluation) and, following the discussion, had written to the National Institute of Rural Development (NIRD), Hyderabad, so that PEO officers could be trained there.

There is silence for a while. Two months later, on November 26, 1997, Deputy Secretary (General Administration) G.S. Randhawa, enters the fray, saying orders have been issued for in-service training programmes at the NIRD. On December 3, 1997, V.K. Bhatia, the man who initiated the file, loops back onto its pages to say that some other das too have been deputed for the NIRD programme. End of the story?

Not at all. Six days later, the seemingly somnolent A.K. Arora is spurred into action, saying there is "no specific relevant course" anywhere but it may be worthwhile to "consider" the Institute of Economic Growth in Delhi. Two days later, V.K. Bhatia writes to "cm section" with reference to Arora's note for "considering" the Institute of Economic Growth.

The year was out, but did Amar Singh proceed to NIRD, Hyderabad, IIPA, Delhi, or anywhere? Unfortunately no. On February 23, 1998, NIRD Director-General R.C. Choudhary's note found its place in the file, saying that he would be offering two programmes, one for three weeks and the other for four, costing Rs 3,500 per participant per week but the minimum number of participants had to be 20. The tab was perhaps too high, for the commission kept quiet for five months. On July 28, 1998, V.K. Bhatia reappeared in the file, submitting that the Institute of Economic Growth wouldn't be a bad idea after all. S.P. Pal, who seemed to be waiting in the wings, roared back three months later, on October 28, saying that "it is not possible for us to send a batch of 20 officers for training for more than two weeks at a stretch" and so the duration of training should be "two weeks or less".

Five more months later, nobody has gone anywhere on training yet. On March 16, 1999, marking the 35th noting on the file, the principal adviser asks what has happened with the IIPA proposal. A day later, adviser (evaluation) notes that the IIPA would take Indian Economic Service (IES) members only, and that the IIPA would not be charging any less than NIRD. It is on August 23, 1999, two years after the file began its journey, that the 48th noting by deputy secretary (General Administration) finally clears Amar Singh and 19 others to go to Hyderabad for the 10-day course in programme evaluation from December 20 to 31. But the story hasn't ended yet. As Ram Singh, yet another officer, entered the 52nd noting on the last day of 1999, the Accounts Branch of the commission had not released the Rs 1,40,000 payment for the course till then.

Shourie began using the matrix for case studies of files pouring into the DAR. "The idea," says DAR Additional Secretary Vivek Agnihotri, "is to identify the underlying reasons of bureaucratic delay." However, regardless of the curative intentions, the diagnostic process itself is unfolding scenarios that would make Alice in Wonderland appear like a realistic work.

A file, for instance, reaches the DAR with a profound query from the Ministry of Steel on which colour of ink is permissible for government work -- green or red. Several notings later, references are made to the Bureau of Indian Standards, which cites a 1962 order saying that red or green colours are okay if you're using a ballpoint pen but, if it's a fountain pen the ink must be blue-black.

At this stage, the personnel secretary enters the debate, and involves the Defence Ministry in the charade, asking if the defence forces have a "uniform ink colour code". The Defence Ministry adds a startling hierarchical twist to the plot. It says while the three chiefs of services are authorised to use red ink, their principal staff officers can write in green ink but not red and the rest of the armed forces must use black or blue ink. Nineteen notings and one year later, the matter is still being pondered over by -- of all persons -- the deputy director of the National Archives.

The chronology-building process in the DAR is churning up such nuggets from every corner of the Government. Like the case of an analyst in the same department, whose claim to be promoted as senior analyst is put on file in December 1997. It takes 37 steps and two years for the matter to be settled in his favour, but a new saga begins as regards the financial sanction for his assignment to renovate the departmental library. The file marched on 10 more steps, with opinions obtained from the Central PWD and such other authorities, until the decision to install a few book racks got approved.

The senior analyst was lucky. He got his promotion, not to speak of the book racks, without running into a dispute. Not so fortunate is the Hindi typist Harish Chandra, who, on July 18, 1996, sought promotion as a junior Hindi translator. There were over 30 notings by officials on issues as abstruse as the art of translation and the relative merit of the argument that if you are quick on the keyboard you may be smarter in finding Hindi synonyms for English words. The Department of Personnel invariably moved in, with fine distinctions in the grades of translators and arguments about whether the promotion would be consistent with the precedents. The matter finally went to the Central Administrative Tribunal, a quasi-judicial authority, which passed an order on March 13, 1999 giving Harish Chandra "temporary charge" as junior Hindi translator.

Shourie's digging operation is not unearthing instances of delay on trivial matters alone. Major projects too wait indefinitely for their turn. Like the April 20, 1998 proposal of Agriculture (Animal Husbandry and Dairy) Joint Commissioner A.K. Batobyal about the National Project on Cattle Buffalo Development with an estimated cost of Rs 402 crore. Batobyal wanted the scheme to be reframed as a Central-sector scheme by clubbing three ongoing schemes: Extension of Frozen Semen Technology, National Wool Production Programme and Assistance to Military Farm. "The objective of the scheme is to bring all the breedable cattle and buffalo under artificial insemination or natural service, to arrange doorstep delivery of AI and to produce progeny tested bulls."

However, since it involved re-categorisation as a Central scheme, the file had to do the rounds in Yojana Bhavan. And there it is shuttled within four rooms, each of which can be reached from another in a minute. There was one "Mr No" who constantly penned his strong protest against treating it as a Central-sector scheme and would instead prefer it to be a "Centrally sponsored scheme". Besides he would like a representative from the Planning Commission to be "inducted in the project management committee". Another officer noted that even to be treated as a Centrally sponsored scheme, it would require approval of the full Planning Commission.

On September 15, 1999 -- that is, after the fall of the first Vajpayee-led government and the conclusion of a border war -- the deputy chairman, Planning Commission, clears the draft note for approval of full commission. On February 3 this year, the file noted that the approval of one of the members was awaited. Also on hold is the project for making frozen cattle semen deliveries at the farmer's doorstep.

Officials working on Shourie's "file chronology" project are hopeful that it may at last throw up an alternative to the current system of pushing decision to the "other guy" and of administering by precedents. Still it can embarrass the Government no end. Shourie is, of course, full of homilies to his "constructive" role as a minister. He'd wring his hands and shake his head in hurt disbelief if you ask him if he's indeed gathering material for his new book. But Shourie is famous for springing surprises. His favourite remark in the pre-ministerial days was: "Every five years I get sacked, so I find a new profession."

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	June 5, 2000