The president, Vishal Singh, of the Swarna Bharat Party (SBP), recently launched political party stated that it is important that the outdated bureaucratic system in the country should be replaced. An efficient and accountable system is must for better governance.
Vishal Singh, president of the Swarna Bharat Party (SBP), India’s only liberal party, declared that it is of critical importance for India to replace its outdated bureaucracy that was created in colonial times with limited knowledge of governance, according to a press release of the party.
Knowledge over the past fifty years in the field of public choice theory and new public management is available to guide the creation of an entirely new machinery of government. The new bureaucracy would be totally accountable for results, and corruption would be entirely eliminated.
This needs senior officials to be appointed by the relevant next senior person (in the case of a Secretary, the relevant Prime Minister/Chief Minister would be the appointing authority) on hire-and-fire contracts that ensure total alignment with performance. Such contracts dispense with any unnecessary and dilatory processes that prevent accountability from being ensured under the current system, provided the integrity of the appointing authority is assured, the press release added.
Such senior officials are to be hired from the open market (mainly amongst the citizens of India), would have to be well paid, comparable to the private sector. This would ensure high quality capability, expertise and demonstrated capability in the bureaucratic system.
Singh said, “Our party is committed to replacing all tenured civil services, such as the IAS, with accountable public servants. This task has been undertaken in many advanced countries without much disruption. All it requires is political will. While we acknowledge that there is considerable talent in the current tenured services, the lack of appropriate incentives has delivered one of the worlds least efficient and accountable bureaucracies.”
The Party’s manifesto has an extensive discussion on this essential governance reform. Singh pointed out, however, that it will not be sufficient (or even possible) to undertake this reform without associated reforms, particularly state funding of elections and in relation to political incentives and accountability, to allow honest people to enter politics on a regular basis. We need honest and committed political leaders, without which a new machinery of governance will not be practicable, according to the press release.
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India continues to have birth pangs, but she is surely being reborn, hopefully with all that makes her great intact, and with all that she needs to make her even greater.