Do it right

Do it right

Lateral entry to civil service must expand, weed out underperformers too.

The Union government move to invite ‘lateral entry’ of talented professionals for ten joint secretary posts with expertise in areas like economic affairs, agriculture and infrastructure sectors like highways, shipping and renewable energy is being touted as a big reform push. Given that several advisers and consultants – both merit based and political appointees – already work in central ministries and state governments and that lateral entry into finance ministry produced illustrious public servants for decades – Manmohan Singh, Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Vijay Kelkar to name a few – government could have aimed for a more ambitious lateral entry programme at all levels.

The case for lateral entry is strong. Civil servants enter public service as generalists and gain experience through district and state level postings. While this offers strong grounding in grassroots realities and effective coordination, building specific domain expertise starts quite late for career bureaucrats. Economic and governance changes since 1991 require quick decision making. A robust private sector implementing big ticket projects and a global pool of subject experts with industry-academia interface have created policy planning and managerial talent that governments must bank on.

Administrative reforms must accompany lateral entry. There should be periodic reviews of mid-career officers to weed out underperformers. IAS monopolies in ministries like home, S&T, sports, etc must go and other cadres deserve consideration too. But lateral entry shouldn’t descend into nepotism and politicisation of bureaucracy. The process of selection needs to be transparent and above reproach. IAS tends to operate as a closed shop and is perhaps India’s most powerful union; resistance to lateral entrants will be immense. However, good governance means getting the bureaucracy right and India’s bureaucracy is widely seen as among the worst in Asia. Opening up lateral entry for just ten positions may, for all these reasons, be too limited a reform to work.