Refurbishing Human Resource Pool & Enforcing Accountability

1. Civil Service Review Committee Report, 2001

The Committee was formed under the chairmanship of Prof. Y.K. Alagh in 1999. The Committee made recommendations mainly on recruitment process including Civil Services Examinations.

2. Surendra Nath Committee Report, 2003

The Committee was formed under the chairmanship of Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Surendra Nath, to review and make recommendations with regards to the system of performance appraisal, promotions and lateral movement in respect of All India Services and other Group-A services. The Committee recommended

i. Computerization of Performance Appraisal System (PAS) and assigning of an agency for an effective monitoring. Development of Master Data Sheet (MDS), which could be used by the committee authorities concerned in various personnel actions, including promotions, selection for particular programs. It will also provide assistance to promotion or empanelment committee in accounting for systematic variations in grading across different state cadres of the same service and identifying inconsistencies between overall grades and grades for individual attributes.

ii. The column on the state of health of Civil Servants may be replaced by a medical report obtained at least once every two year. Assessment of skills for higher assignment to be based on incumbent improving his/her relevant formal professional qualification, including career training and other relevant study training programs, etc.

iii. Domain Knowledge: To enhance domain knowledge, Committee favoured assigning of several domains (say 3), so that the officer may develop interest in one or the other area and have opportunity to pursue their career in the area of his interest. Eleven domains were identified. These are; Agriculture and rural development, Social sector (Education, Health, Tribal Welfare, tec.), Cultural and Information, Natural Resource Management including Environment (Green Side), Energy and Environment (Brown Side), Community System and Connectivity infrastructure, Public Finance and Financial Management, Industry and Trade, Domestic Affairs and Defense, Housing and Urban Affairs and Personnel and General Administration.

3. NCRWC Recommendations on Public Administration

The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (NCRWC), set up in 2000 under the chairmanship of Justice Venkatchalliah submitted its report in 2002. Its report included chapters on “Executive and Public Administration” Some relevant recommendations of the National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution (NCRWC) are quoted below.

3.1 The questions of personnel policy including placements, promotions, transfers and fast-track advancements on the basis of forward-looking career management policies and techniques should be managed by autonomous Personnel Boards for assisting the high level political authorities in making key decisions. Such Civil Service Boards should be constituted under statutory provisions. They should be expected to function like the UPSC. The sanctity of parliamentary legislation under article 309 is needed to counteract the publicly known trends of the play of unhealthy and destabilizing influences in the management of public services in general and higher civil services in particular. [Para 6.7.1]

3.2 Above a certain level—say the Joint Secretary level - all posts should be open for recruitment from a wide variety of sources including the open market. Government should specialize some of the generalists and generalize some of the specialists through proper career management which has to be freed from day to day political manipulation and influence peddling. [Para 6.7.2]

3.3 Social audit of official working should be done for developing accountability and answerability. Officials, before starting their career, in addition to the taking of an oath of loyalty to the Constitution, should swear to abide by the basic principles of good governance. This would give renewed sense of commitment by the executives to the basic tenets of the Constitution. [Para 6.7.3]

3.4 The services have remained largely immune from imposition of penalties due to the complicated procedures that have grown out of the constitutional guarantee against arbitrary and vindictive action (article 311). The constitutional safeguards have in practice acted to shield the guilty against swift and certain punishment for abuse of public office for private gain. A major corollary has been erosion of accountability. It has accordingly become necessary to re-visit the issue of constitutional safeguards under article 311 to ensure that the honest and efficient officials are given the requisite protection but the dishonest are not allowed to prosper in office. A comprehensive examination of the entire corpus of administrative jurisprudence has to be undertaken to rationalize and simplify the procedure of adminis-trative and legal action and to bring the theory and practice of security of tenure in line with the experience of the last more than 50 years. [Para 6.7.4]

3.5 The civil service regulations need to be changed radically in the light of contemporary administrative theory to introduce modern evaluation methodology. [Para 6.7.5]

3.6 The administrative structure and systems have to be consciously redesigned to give appropriate recognition to the professional and technical services so that they may play their due role in modernizing our economy and society. The specialist should not be required to play second fiddle to the generalist at the top. Conceptually we need to develop a collegiate style of administrative management where the leader is an energizer and a facilitator, and not an oracle delivering verdicts from a high pedestal. [Para 6.7.6] 3.7 A parliamentary legislation under article 312(1) should be enacted. It should be debated in professional circles as well as by the general public. [Para 6.7.7]

4. Hota committee report

The Committee was appointed by Government in 2004 under the chairmanship of Shri P.C. Hota. The Committee noted at the outset that

“We are, however, aware that reforming the higher civil service is no substitute for reforming governmental processes and administrative structures. When citizen interface is substantially with the junior functionaries of government, there are obvious limits to achieving citizencentric governance through reforms of higher civil service alone. Nevertheless, it is our hope that the principles emphasized in our Report will be taken to the cutting edge level. To ensure citizen-centric governance, many of the recommendations of our Report have gone beyond the higher civil service and touched upon the basic structures of the governmental machinery.” The Committee also summed up some of the main observations of participants in their workshops. Some of these are as follows:

(i) “By and large the civil service in India has lost its neutral and anonymous character and even though there are still some upright civil servants, they are getting marginalized in the process of governance.”

(ii) “Increasingly, corrupt practices have become prevalent in the higher civil service and public perception of higher civil servants as a class is not edifying.”

(iii) “The higher civil servants – particularly, officers of the Indian Administrative Service, Indian Police Service, and Indian Forest Service working in different States of the country do not have a fixed tenure in any post and hence are not able to achieve the targets fixed for them in their assignments. In the absence of any fixed tenure, these officers of the All India Services are not able to function as effective instruments of public policy and are simply wasted due to frequent transfers from one post to the other.”

(iv) “A majority of civil servants are arrogant. They are not perceived as people-friendly and by and large they have lost touch with ground realities. There is a sharp decline in their field visits and inspections of field programmes. Civil servants in the States have almost given up the earlier practice of sustained tours of remote areas and night halts in those areas which are so essential to understand and redress problems of the poor and the weaker sections of the community.”

(v) “There is ‘groupism’ among higher civil servants and increasingly they have been divided along sectarian lines – an extremely unfortunate development.”

(vi) “Some civil servants develop an unhealthy nexus with power brokers and do not hesitate to resort to questionable means to get good postings in India or abroad.”

(vii) “After 15 years of service, a rigorous review should be made of performance of higher civil servants to weed out the corrupt and the inefficient. “

(viii) “Article 311 of the Constitution is meant to protect honest and efficient civil servants and not to shield the corrupt and the inefficient. Article 311 of the Constitution should be amended to remove corrupt officials from service and give them an opportunity to defend themselves in a post decisional hearing only after their removal from service. If the civil servant is exonerated in the post-decisional hearing, he may be restored his entire service benefits including arrears of pay and allowances.”

(ix) “The Indian Administrative Service should not monopolize all key posts in the Government of India. There are a large number of talented officers in other two All- India Services and the Central Services who deserve to hold key posts in Government of India under the Central Staffing Scheme or other key posts in the States.”

(x) “Far too many officers of different services are promoted quickly and in the different States of the Indian Union there are a large number of officers of the grade of Commissioners, Principal Secretaries to Government, Additional Director Generals and Director Generals of Police. If too many top level positions in the IAS create problems of cadre management, too many senior posts in the IPS create problems of unity of command.”

(xi) “Officers of different services who are some of the brightest when they enter the service do not feel motivated to excel in performance as they grow in the service. They stop reading books and journals so necessary to increase their domain knowledge. As issues in public administration are becoming increasingly complex and as some of these issues are scientific and technical in character, officers of the higher civil service, particularly officers of the IAS, as leaders of multi-disciplinary teams, must acquire more domain knowledge as they go into senior positions.”

(xii) “Training of officers both in the foundational course and also in professional courses must be given adequate importance. At periodic intervals every officer of the higher civil service must spend a few months under training in Management Development or in other areas of skill formation. Compulsory visit to inaccessible rural areas and preparation of reports on the problems of such areas should be made part of training course.”

(xiii) “Most of the civil servants fail to achieve results because they are not given targets of performance or the infrastructural support to achieve them. Most Departments/ Ministries have no mission or vision statements. A reality check is essential through which performance of every Department and Ministry should be reviewed and the correctives applied. Without performance targets, the civil service degenerates into a closed priesthood with no accountability.”

(xiv) “There is enough scope for a civil servant to introspect whether as a member of the higher civil service his conduct is free of blemish.”

(xv) “Secularism and the Rule of Law are two of the basic features of the Constitution. But they will remain on paper unless they are enforced and in this task of enforcement the civil service should play a significant role.” (xvi) “Transfers and postings of officers of the civil service should be entrusted to a Civil Services Board/Establishment Board comprising senior civil servants.”

(xvii) “Reforms in the higher civil service will not yield the desired result unless the lower formations of civil service at the cutting edge of administration improve their performance.”

(xviii)“Those who deviate from the core values of the civil service such as honesty, integrity and political neutrality must be ostracized by the general body of civil servants. Service Associations/Departments of Government of India and Government of States should be encouraged to identify the corrupt and the inefficient in a secret ballot. The list of such officials may be forwarded to the Government of India and the respective State Governments for follow up action to remove the identified officers from service if such removal is justified on facts of the case.”

(xix) “Workload of the civil service has increased manifold. Workload has increased in government because paperwork has increased and government is trying to do too many things at the same time. Government must re-orient itself to perform only core functions.”

(xx) “Officers of the All India Service in the States particularly District Magistrates and Collectors and Superintendents of Police are spending too much time in protocol and security duties. To ensure that District Magistrates and Collectors and other senior officers in field formation get time to interact with the common people and solve their problems, protocol and security duties of these officials must be reviewed to limit their ceremonial functions.”

(xxi) “Ideally, a Secretary to Government of India or officer holding an equivalent post or a Chief Secretary, Director General of Police, Principal Chief Conservator of Forests should have a tenure of at least two years but retire at the normal age of superannuation.”

(xxii) “The civil service should be politically neutral to inspire confidence in their functioning under different political masters, often belonging to diverse political parties. To ensure that they remain politically neutral, they should not be given any post-retirement appointments as members/chairman of statutory commissions, quasi-judicial tribunals, or even in constitutional authorities such as the State Public Service Commission, Union Public Service Commission, Comptroller and Auditor-General of India, and Election Commission of India.” .

(xxiii)“A retired civil servant/a civil servant who has resigned should not be appointed to the high constitutional office of Governor of State unless there is a gap of at least two years between his resignation/retirement and appointment.”

(xxiv)“A government servant on resignation or on retirement, should not be allowed to join a political party and contest any election for a political office on the ticket of a political party or even as an independent candidate. A period of two years must elapse before he is allowed to do so.”

(xxv) “Ministers and Secretaries to the Government of India should not be from the same State. This will ensure that the common people perceive the relationship between the Minister and Secretary to the Government of India as a purely professional relationship.”

(xxvi)“No member of the higher civil service should be appointed as Private Secretary to a Union Minister or a Minister of State with independent charge or a Minister in the State Government. Junior officers of the higher civil service often use their contacts to get appointed to such posts and exercise extra constitutional power.” (xxvii)“It is only when the political masters in a democracy take interest in civil service reforms that the reforms will acquire meaning and substance.”

5. 2nd Administrative Reform Commission

In its 10th Report, “Refurbishing the Personnel Administration – Scaling new Heights”, the Commission has made wide ranging recommendations pertaining to Human Resource Management and enforcing accountability. Some of the relevant recommendations are given below.

5.1 Stage of Entry into the Civil Services (Para 5.3.6)

Government of India should establish National Institutes of Public Administration to run Bachelor’s Degree courses in public administration/governance/management. In the long run it is expected that these specialized centres of excellence (National Institutes of Public Administration) would evolve as major sources of civil services aspirants. Selected Central and other Universities should also be assisted to offer such graduate level programmes in public administration/governance /public management which will produce graduates to further expand the pool of eligible applicants to the civil services. Graduates of the above mentioned special courses from the National Institutes of Public Administration and selected universities would be eligible for appearing in the Civil Services Examinations. Further, graduates in other disciplines would also be eligible to appear in the Civil Services Examination provided they complete a ‘Bridge Course’ in the core subjects mentioned above. The Bridge course should be run by the same selected national institutes/universities, which conduct the graduate level courses.

5.2 Capacity Building (Para 6.8)

Every government servant should undergo a mandatory training at the induction stage and also periodically during his/her career. Successful completion of these trainings should be a minimum necessary condition for confirmation in service and subsequent promotions. The objective of mid-career training should be to develop domain knowledge and competence required for the changing job profile of the officer.

5.3 Recruitment at Group ‘B’ Level (Para 7.3.3)

Prima facie the Commission is of the view that in order to infuse fresh thinking, a certain percentage of vacancies (say 25% every year) at the level of Section Officer as well as for other specialized Group ‘B’ posts, should be filled through ‘Direct Recruitment’.

5.4 Recruitment for LDCs (Para 7.6.6)

The Commission endorses the stand taken by the Government that recruitment of LDCs should be phased out.

5.5 Placement at Middle Management Level (Para 8.7)

In posting officers in Government of India, the primary consideration should be to select the most suitable person for the post that is on offer. Domains should be assigned by the Central Civil Services Authority to all officers of the All India Services and the Central Civil Services on completion of 13 years of service. The Central Civil Services Authority should invite applications from all officers who have completed the minimum qualifying years of service, for assignment of domains. The applications should specify the academic background of officers, their research accomplishments (if any) and significant achievements during their career, relevant to the domain applied for. A consultative process should be put in place where the officers should be interviewed and their claims to specific domains evaluated. The Authority should thereafter assign domains to the officers on the basis of this exercise. In case some domains do not attract applicants, the Authority should assign these domains to officers with the relevant knowledge and experience.

All vacancies arising at the level of Deputy Secretary/Director during a financial year should be identified well before the beginning of that financial year, by the Department of Personnel and Training (DOPT). The Ministries concerned should also give a brief job description for these positions. All these posts and their job description should be notified to the cadre controlling authorities of the concerned All India Services and Central Services. On receipt of nominations from the cadre controlling authorities, the DOPT should try to match the requirements of various positions with the competencies of the officers in the ‘offer list’. The DOPT should then seek approval for the entire list from the Competent Authority.

The Central Civil Services Authority should be charged with the responsibility of fixing tenure for all civil service positions and this decision of the Authority should be binding on Government. Officers from the organized services should not be given ‘non-field’ assignments in the first 8-10 years of their career. State Governments should take steps to constitute State Civil Services Authorities on the lines of the Central Civil Services Authority.

5.6 Placement at Top Management Level (Para 9.8)

The present empanelment system for short-listing officers for posting at the SAG level and above should be replaced by a more transparent and objective placement procedure. At higher levels in government, it is necessary to ensure that the tasks assigned to a public servant match his/her domain competence as well as aptitude and potential. Ministries should classify all of their SAG level posts according to their relevant functional domains.

There is need to introduce competition for senior positions in government (SAG and above) by opening these positions in Government (including attached and subordinate offices) to all Services. This principle would apply to all posts including those that are presently encadred with the organized Group ‘A’ Services. In order to operationalise this, government should make the continued participation of any of the organised civil services in the Central Staffing Scheme, contingent upon the implementation of this principle in those Departments/Cadres. For the positions at the Joint Secretary/SAG level and above, the Central Civil Services Authority would invite applications from amongst all the eligible officers from the All India Services and Group ‘A’ Central Services which are participating in the scheme. For positions at the HAG level and above, the Central Public Service Authority would, in consultation with Government, earmark positions for which outside talent would be desirable. Applications to fill up these posts would be invited from interested and eligible persons from the open market and also, from serving eligible officers. While carrying out this exercise, the Central Civil Services Authority would stipulate the eligibility criteria, the required domain expertise as well as the requirements of qualifications, seniority and work experience. The Authority would conduct interviews to short-list suitable officers for these posts. Government would make the final selection on the basis of this shortlist.

A Central Civil Services Authority should be constituted under the proposed Civil Services Bill. The Central Civil Services Authority shall be a five-member body consisting of the Chairperson and four members (including the member-secretary). The Authority should have a full time Member-Secretary of the rank of Secretary to Government of India. The Chairperson and members of the Authority should be persons of eminence in public life and professionals with acknowledged contributions to society. The Chairperson and members of the Authority shall be appointed by the President on the recommendations of a Committee consisting of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha. The Central Civil Services Authority should deal with matters of assignment of domains to officers, preparing panels for posting of officers at the level of Joint Secretary and above, fixing tenures for senior posts, deciding on posts which could be advertised for lateral entry and such other matters that may be referred to it by the Government.

5.7 Performance Management System (Para 11.15)

A good employee performance appraisal system is a pre-requisite for an effective performance management system. The existing performance appraisal system should be strengthened to make appraisal more consultative and transparent – performance appraisal systems for all Services should be modified on the lines of the recently introduced PAR for the All India Services. Government should expand the scope of the present performance appraisal system of its employees to a comprehensive performance management system (PMS). Annual performance agreements should be signed between the departmental minister and the Secretary of the ministry/heads of departments, providing physical and verifiable details of the work to be done during a financial year. The actual performance should be assessed by a third party – say, the Central Public Services Authority – with reference to the annual performance agreement. The details of the annual performance agreements and the result of the assessment by the third party should be provided to the legislature as a part of the Performance Budget/Outcome Budget.

5.8 Motivating Civil Servants (Para 12.5)

It should be the responsibility of the head of the office to examine the job content of each person working in the organization to ensure that the job content is meaningful and challenging so that the employee derives a sense of satisfaction in performing the tasks assigned to him/her. The head of the office could seek the assistance of a professional agency for this purpose. Each head of office should ensure that a congenial work environment is created in the office. His/her success in this should be an element in evaluating his/her performance.

5.9 Accountability (Para 13.4)

A system of two intensive reviews – one on completion of 14 years of service, and another on completion of 20 years of service - should be established for all government servants. The first review at 14 years would primarily serve the purpose of intimating to the public servant about his/her strengths and shortcomings for his/her future

advancement. The second review at 20 years would mainly serve to assess the fitness of the officer for his/her further continuation in government service. The services of public servants, who are found to be unfit after the second review at 20 years, should be discontinued. A provision regarding this should be made in the proposed Civil Services Law. Besides, for new appointments it should be expressly provided that the period of employment shall be for 20 years. Further continuance in government service would depend upon the outcome of the intensive performance reviews.

5.10 Disciplinary Proceedings (Para 14.6)

In the proposed Civil Services law, the minimum statutory disciplinary and dismissal procedures required to satisfy the criteria of natural justice should be spelt out leaving the details of the procedure to be followed to the respective government departments. The present oral inquiry process should be converted into a disciplinary meeting or interview to be conducted by a superior officer in a summary manner without the trappings and procedures borrowed from court trials. This would require that the CCS (CCA) Rules, 1965 be repealed and substituted by appropriate regulations.

5.11 Relationship between the Political Executive and Civil Servants (Para 15.6)

There is a need to safeguard the political neutrality and impartiality of the civil services. The onus for this lies equally on the political executive and the civil services. This aspect should be included in the Code of Ethics for Ministers as well as the Code of Conduct for Public Servants.

5.12 Other Recommendations

The Commission would like to reiterate its recommendation made in its Report on “Ethics in Governance” while examining the definition of corruption under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, wherein it has been recommended that “abuse of authority unduly favouring or harming someone” and “obstruction of justice” should be classified as an offence under the Act. A new Civil Services Bill may be drafted. ‘Civil Services Values’ and the ‘Code of Ethics’ should be incorporated in the proposed Civil Services Bill.