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Honourable Prime Minister,
You have been given the
responsibility by the people of India to improve their lives. They want
opportunities for decent livelihoods, better public services, health,
education and safety. They have lost faith in most institutions of
governance and administration. Indeed, the deterioration in the
country’s institutions is also the root cause of the declining growth of
the economy. Investors are wary of starting or expanding enterprises
when there is so much confusion and corruption in governance. The
scenario analysis made by the Planning Commission in 2012 revealed that
the root cause of the poor progress the country is making, which is
neither meeting its needs nor the aspirations of its citizens in
improving human development, building infrastructure, growing the
economy and creating more jobs, is the deep mistrust citizens and
investors have in the institutions. Indeed, it was estimated by the
Commission that fixing this root cause could add about 3% to GDP growth.
The
root cause of the deterioration of our institutions is a failure of
leadership. So-called ‘leaders’ sit atop institutions with important
titles bestowed on them. For them, institutions are only pedestals from
which they can speak, and on which they can be seen. They do not care to
improve the substance of the institutions they are responsible for. Nor
are they being held to account for failing to discharge this vital
responsibility to the people.
Honourable Prime Minister, you
must make an agenda to fix some important institutions. Place people
atop them who citizens (and you) will trust. Charge these persons with
developing a plan to reform their institutions. And visibly monitor the
progress they make so that citizens and investors can have confidence
that at long last someone is doing something forcefully to improve
institutions. This is not a 100-day exercise. But bold steps, in the
right direction, must be visible within 100 days. In some instances,
where there are incumbents and you cannot appoint others yet, you can
demand that the incumbents apply themselves to improve the quality of
the institutions they are supposed to lead, or face the consequences.
Institutional
transformation, even with a good plan, can take three to five years.
The present HR system of government must be changed to enable people to
lead and change institutions for a reasonable time, and not just for the
year or two that the present seniority-based system results in. Indeed,
the 2nd Administrative Reforms Commission had made some important
recommendations for reforming the civil services including more rigorous
performance evaluation, and up-or-out with lateral inductions also at
senior levels.
Please restore the autonomy of the
government-supported institutions that should be run professionally.
They are a vital part of our governance system. These include various
commissions and regulators, bodies like the National Productivity
Council and Quality Council of India, and our PSEs too. There is too
much interference by ministries in these and many of them have become
sinecures for retired bureaucrats.
Honourable Prime Minister, the
fabric of governance of our large and diverse country, which is
committed to democracy — that is government for, but also of and by the
people — will never be strong if governance is not devolved to people
closer to realities on the ground. Our Constitution wisely requires
this, by giving powers to the states, and to local village and urban
bodies too (by the 73rd and 74th Amendments to the Constitution).
However, the Centre, and people at the top of institutions, are holding
on to power. You must put your weight behind a vigorous process of
building up capacities in the states and in institutions on the ground
to govern more effectively.
Last but not least, Honourable Prime
Minister, you will have to insist that people collaborate with each
other and you will have to pull up those who do not. We cannot make
coalition governments an excuse for poor governance. Coalitions in
government are likely to be around for quite a while. Improvement of
governance cannot wait until some day when we have a unitary government
again. We want improvement in public services and human development now.
We want jobs now. We want faster growth now. Therefore, we need leaders
now who can work with others and who inspire others to work in teams
and demand that they do too.
Our hope is that you will transform our institutions and improve governance. The rest will follow.
(Arun Maira is the author of ‘Redesigning the Aeroplane While Flying: Reforming Institutions’, published by Rupa in May 2014)
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