There has been a change in the administration in Tamil Nadu and subsequently there has been a massive reshuffle of senior officers. Usually the common man is hardly affected by such changes of civil servants and the public pay little or no attention to such transfers. However, this time around, has there been harsh criticism of the changes effected by the Karunanidhi Government. Why? The media has played a role in this, with news reports pointing out that the new government is wreaking vengeance on some officials. The Government is also charged as placing in vital positions, officers who are considered close to it.

Naturally such news reports trigger a number of doubts and questions among the public. “What is the role of such civil servants in governance? Are they actually helpful to those in power? And is that why they are changed when the Government changes?” … and so on and so forth.

Though many people are aware of political issues most are unaware of the details and intricacies of the “administration” that the politicians carry out.

It should be noted here that the questions and details about the administration are far more important and crucial than politics.

For instance, how do new ministers handle the development plans of the government? How are plan expenditures, policy decisions, the Budget, Central fund allocations, the administrative capabilities of the state government are handled? And what is role of the bureaucrats?

Equally important are questions such as are ministers getting correct information on official matters? Does the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues understand the civil servants correctly or do they get deceived by those officers who are able to ‘act’ efficiently in front of them and thereby lose in the next general election? And do they consider this wrong choice of officials after having lost at the hustings? Or, do they once again form a government and follow the advice of another set of pretending civil servants and lose once again.

If a government’s duty is service to the people, is it possible to accomplish this task by activating the bureaucracy and the government’s powers efficiently? Does what happen at the Chief Secretariat find an echo in the remotest small village of the state? And how accurate are arguments like “the treasury is empty and so it is not possible to implement developmental plans meant for the people”?

In short how valid is the argument that the Budget, funds, plan expenditure, etc.

I am regularly asked “How do civil servants behave when a new minister joins to work with them? Do they teach him the subtleties of governance and prepare him in a proper manner?”

This is a profound issue and forms the very foundation of a government. The government machine, its several parts, officers and officials, our state’s civil servants, especially, high ranking officers, such as the IAS, IPS, DRO and Deputy Collectors literally decide a government’s performance. This is not as acute in other countries, the reason being our historical background.

Our mode of governance did not evolve over time to suit our administrative needs by itself, nor did it progress step by step. It was created by a foreign government whose requirements were paramount; the needs and problems facing the bureaucracy of those days and its goals were highly different from those of today.

For instance, in pre-Independence days, in the 1800s, the government had two main tasks: revenue collection and the maintenance of law and order. But the jobs that had to be done by the government after Independence became too long to list here and we shall scrutinize them later. At this point it is enough to comment that a bureaucracy that was formed to perform two clear tasks, viz., collection of revenue and maintenance of law-and-order continues to do multifarious tasks without any change of setup even today.

Before we look at how the administration functions, it is important to note how such a honourable, efficient and responsible bureaucratic machinery lost its glory and status. Let us examine a few examples that illustrate this sorry tale.

Let us see what happens on the very first day when an IAS officer assumes office as a Departmental Secretary after being selected as a Secretary to Government which is considered to be a plum post.

First, he meets the Chief Minister, presents a bouquet and bows before him to offer his gratitude for being selected as a Secretary to Government. This is not as easy a task as it seems. Very few people will believe the ordeals such a senior IAS officer has to undergo to complete what looks like a simple task. Each Chief Minister has developed certain traits and habits, which in turn have become a routine.

As far as Tamil Nadu is concerned these habits have attained scientific dimensions and have developed into clear-cut ground rules. IAS officers serving in other states are shocked when they hear of such practices. We will study this issue too later!

Former Chief Minister Ms J Jayalalithaa was not in the habit of meeting officers. But that doesn’t mean an IAS officer on becoming a Secretary could avoid his ‘duty’ of bouquet presentation to the CM. It would be a near impossible task, all right, but he has to make the attempt. He may get an appointment to meet the CM or he may not. She would accept the bouquets from some directly; most would never even get an answer for their requests for appointments. Some officers would have to leave their bouquets, along with their names, posts, and addresses noted therein.

The last time Ms Jayalalithaa had to give up her CM’s post due to Court Rulings for sometime (when Mr.Panneerselvam became CM) and regained power after a brief period. On that day about 100 IAS and IPS officers thronged her Poes Garden residence with bouquets and costly shawls, where they left them and went away without meeting her. These included their names and addresses, which were believed to have been brought to the then Chief Minister’s notice, or at least that was the belief of the poor officers who left such gifts there.

If Ms Jayalalithaa met an officer, and received his/her bouquet personally, that was taken to mean as a special favour and as if this officer is personally known to her. This would then become a hot topic in the Secretariat. The opposite was also believed to be true. If an officer could not present his gift in person, colleagues and observers would assume that he or she was not enamoured by that officer’s performance or was unhappy about him due to some reason.

But though this was the general belief there could be little truth behind such specious reasoning. It was not as if she preferred those whom she met directly and accepted their gifts and vice versa. While these antics occupied much of the discussions at the Secretariat, Ms Jayalalithaa did not care whether officers meet her or not. Many officers too welcomed this attitude, less problems you see!

At the same time, there were many officers who would wish to meet Ms Jayalalithaa and receive her blessings in person, willy nilly. There has developed certain practices for this. Ms Jayalalithaa had about four secretaries (this later grew to 6 to 8 ) One of these secretaries would advise an officer on how to go about meeting Ms Jayalalithaa,

For example, there was one IPS officer who was determined to meet Ms Jayalalithaa and get her blessings. While he did not get an appointment, he made sure that he would be present in the Secretariat portico when the Chief Minister got out of her car. A smart salute would follow. He would repeat his performance near the lift. And he finally aroused Ms Jayalalithaa’s curiosity and finally won an appointment to meet her. He later on rose to become one of her most loyal officers and got quite close to her.

Thus, if an IAS officer wants to be in the good books of a Chief Minister he needs the help and assistance of an official in the CM’s office.

And today, there are other strange aspects in meeting today’s Chief Minister M Karunanidhi.

If one wished to meet Chief Minister Karunanidhi, he would have to seek and get an appointment from one particular Personal Assistants of the leader and on that particular day and time meet him, seek his blessings offering the bouquet. If an officer does not come forward voluntarily, Karunanidhi has been known to complain that such and such officer selected by him for a good post like the Secretary to government has not met him.

Let me mention here, that this article is not meant to compare the behaviour of the two chief ministers and criticize their attitude in the matter of accepting the obeisance of officers. It is my sincere desire that people must be aware of how things work and am telling you exactly how things work. When we scrutinize their actions, not only do their attitudes towards officials come to light but also such attitude is seen to reflect in their political styles.

Karunanidhi believes that if he was to help out a person or give an officer some good postings and when such people exhibit their gratitude by actions like bowing before him, then such persons will be loyal and steadfast to him.

But Jayalalithaa has a totally different method of operation. Handing out responsibilities according to her likes and dislikes, she is convinced that the concerned officer or political functionary should then prove or disprove his loyalty to retain his or her postings, etc, are his responsibility.

Then, a civil servant who is appointed as the Secretary of a department has also to get the blessings of the Chief Secretary and the Minister of the concerned department. Presentation of bouquets or shawls is left to his discretion, though it is the current tradition not to give any bouquet or shawl to the Chief Secretary. There is a reason for this as well. Presently, a Chief Secretary has no power in the appointment of an IAS officer, who naturally does not bother to pay too much attention to his senior.

But about 40 years back, the situation was quite different. The posting of IAS officers was completely in the hands of the Chief Secretary. The concerned file would merely go to the Chief Minister for approval.

Let us return to the present. Now after all the rituals of presentations, seeking blessings etc., are complete, a Secretary begins to prepare to do his job. The first thing he will find is a long line of officers from his own departments waiting to meet him with apples, fruit baskets, bouquets shawls etc.

Let us take as an example the case of the Secretary to the Department of School Education. The Directors of School Education, Government Examinations, Libraries, Matriculation Schools, Elementary Education will also present general notes on their directorates. The Secretary would go through them one by one, debate various issues with the Directors and try and get a grasp of the various problems facing each directorate, how they work and the rules and regulations governing them. This is quite a difficult task.

It is indeed unfortunate that today IAS officers neither bring experience, thought process nor a high grade of intelligence to understand their workload, take the proper decision and that too amidst a severe workload. They are mere puppets who merely follow orders “from above”.

Further, even those in government, let alone the common man, have no idea of how the changes in governments and the consequent wholesale transfers of senior civil servants affect the process of good governance.

After the 1996 elections which the DMK won, it focused its actions on the previous AIADMK government’s corruption and went around announcing that it would take severe action. As a start, it brought a senior civil servant, Mr. Nambiar, from Delhi and made him the State’s Chief Secretary. He promptly sent a secret circular to all the government Secretaries which said: “Immediately list all the corruption and contraventions of rules sleaze that took place in your department and send it.” Almost all officers sent what is known as a “Nil Report” which meant that nothing happened. Then a colleague of the Chief Secretary remarked that since the Secretaries to the departments who functioned in the previous government continued in this new government also it is not practical to expect that they will report the irregularities committed by the previous regime. This is because these Secretaries could also have been part of such misdeeds. Then all Secretaries were shifted and the new ones brought to light the various misdeeds committed by the previous AIADMK regime.

We have to bear this fact in mind: now-a-days civil servants act in accordance, as far as possible, with the wishes of Ministers and other political leaders. And in a number of instances such actions are against laws, regulations and rules. In fact on many occasions officers themselves teach Ministers, and the Chief Minister, how to bend the rules and manipulate the legal process; a sad state of affairs in itself! Therefore there seems to be some justification in the mass transfer of senior civil servants when a new regime takes over the administration after a General Election.

Though it was officially known that the new DMK Govt. would assume office on May, 12th, 2006, more than 100 IAS and IPS officers, went to Arivalayam, the DMK headquarters, and sought 'darshan’ from Karunanidhi on May 11, the day the counting of votes indicated a victory for the DMK and that too amidst a huge throng of party workers. Chief Secretary Narayanan and DGP Alexander is reported to have met Karunanidhi at his residence on the evening of May 11 and discussed details about the latter’s assumption of office, details like, where, when and how.

Above all, Government Orders (G.O.) about Karunanidhi’s electoral promises on giving rice at Rs 2 per kilo and on the waiver of loans from co-operative societies were prepared the day before the new Govt. assumed office. Both these had to be done by the Chief Secretary, an event unheard of happening in any other State in India.

By law, the file should be prepared and sent for approval on the 13^th , i.e., on the day of swearing in power only legal authority to move a policy file accrues to a new government and the signature could have been obtained on the 14^th of May, at the very least.

The very day after assuming office, the Chief Secretary was transferred to the post of Commissioner of Archives, an insignificant post. Talking to me a retired Chief Secretary (from another state) said: A Chief Secretary is not transferred on the change of a government. He continues to function until retirement when another senior is appointed as CS according to seniority. What is happening in Tamil Nadu is not good.”

But the scenario in TN is very different. When Civil Servants and bureaucrats act almost as though they are part of the ruling party, why would not the incoming government transfer them? What else can be the result? When a senior officer goes out of his way and tries hard to have the ruling party retain power, what else will the opposition party, that has won, do but transfer him? How can anybody fault such a move? And this is what is also happening in Tamil Nadu.

A number of bureaucrats and senior police officers – including some from the CM’s office itself -, who had earned the goodwill of Jayalalithaa, rushed to meet Karunanidhi and pay their respect as soon as it had become clear that the DMK was going to win.

It was a rare sight to see senior officers try similar stunts at DMK headquarters. Despite all this, most of the civil servants and police officers, who were close to Jayalalithaa and her regime and had obtained crucial posts, were transferred to posts with little or no power.