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Lack of self-regulation among bureaucrats rued
- In the wake of senior IAS officers drawing flak for their alleged compliance with the controversial decisions taken by their political masters and paying a price for it, senior bureaucrats attribute the state of sorry affairs to the collapse of internal mechanism to ensure self-regulation among the officers.
- “Nothing like peer pressure to caution the officials who compromise on their code of conduct. Being subtly reined in by their own ilk will certainly have the desired impact,” a senior bureaucrat said.
- Such self-regulation was sorely missing in the government which rarely acted even on serious complaints of corruption. For instance, when the APIIC complained against Emaar Properties for deviating from the agreement with the Corporation, the government should have taken corrective action immediately.
- A retired IAS officer emphasised that there should be a group of senior and reputed bureaucrats to clean the administrative service.
- This process, however, should be subtle, on low key and involve continuous education about code of conduct and business rules so that the dignity and reputation of the service would remain intact, he said.
- In Uttar Pradesh a few years ago, the IAS Officers Association held a secret ballot to identify the most corrupt among them.
- Another IAS officer, however, sees a silver lining in the recent developments as it had exposed the nexus between the bureaucrats and politicians.
- Meanwhile, senior IAS officers have said that their Association's resolution to extend law equally to the political heads and bureaucrats for the decision making process had been misunderstood to mean that they were shielding the officials listed as accused in cases under investigation by the CBI.
- What the Association sought to emphasise was the inconsistency in the inquiry process and its view that the CBI's appreciation of rules and procedures governing the decision-making process seemed limited.
