Steel frame cracking in Bihar, Jharkhand

Patna, January 12, 2009

A politician's prime job is to formulate policies while the bureaucrats are required to execute them. This simple division of duty, however, leaves both Bihar and Jharkhand with a Herculean task to grapple with.

This is because while the two states have a surfeit of politicians to frame policies, there are just not enough IAS officers to execute the plans to fruition. Bihar currently has 264 sanctioned positions, but only 232 IAS officers to choose from. Besides, because of being on the central deputation, many officers aren't available for duty now.

This leaves Bihar with less than 200 IAS officers. The story is even worse in Jharkhand where the number of IAS officers available at present is just 103 against a sanctioned strength of 143. Besides, 20 bureaucrats have been sent for central duty.

In Jharkhand, of the 43 posts for promoted IAS officers, more than a dozen are lying vacant. In addition to this, three vacancies for non-civil service officials also exist. The status in Jharkhand has worsened following the superannuation of five IAS officers—P.P. Sharma, S.D. Sharma, Siyaram Prasad Sinha, M.P. Mishra and Virendra Kumar—in July, 2007. In addition to this, IAS officers Jai Shankar Tiwari and Mohan Lal Rai have also hanged their boots, last year. This is not all. The acute shortage of IAS officers is likely to worsen, as 11 of them—Sushma Singh, A.K. Rath, Rahul Sarin (secretaries in the Union government), A.K. Basu, J.S. Burjia, Jhunnu Kisko, Sahjanand Sharma, S.S. Prasad, V.P.N. Singh, R.S. Jaipuriar and Carnelius Ekka will retire in 2009. Indeed, IAS officers of Jharkhand cadre are attaining the superannuation age in bulk every year, even as Delhi is allotting only one or two elite babus for the State.

Jharkhand has been allotted only 9 direct recruits since 2000 when so far over a dozen of them have retired while two—Chintu Nayak and Mary Beena Kachchap—died in harness. If the figure of promoted IAS officials is included the number of total IAS officers who retired in Jharkhand will cross 40. But, so far less than 15 officers from state service have been promoted to IAS cadre. In Bihar too, two chief secretary rank officers—Madan Mohan Singh and R.C. Vaishya—have superannuated last year. Two other 1972 batch officers, M.N. Prasad and K.D. Sinha will hang their boots in 2009 along with four 1973 batch IAS officers—Chief Secretary R.J.M. Pillai, S. Vijayraghawan, V. Jayashankar and G.S. Dutt.

This is likely to spell further trouble for Bihar, considered India's most trouble-ridden state, which stands pushed to the bottom of many tables. In fact, the state government is willing to accommodate IAS officers of other cadres on lateral deputation to Bihar.

The trouble is that none seems to be wiling to this effect. "The state government has already taken up the issue with the Centre, demanding the increase of IAS cadres. The initiative, however, is yet to yield results," said a secretariat officer. In the current scenario, with Delhi paying little heed to Bihar's request seeking more directly recruited IAS officers, the best way out, senior babus believe, is to promote state service officials to IAS cadre.

But then there is a cap as well. Only 33 per cent of the IAS cadre strength can be filled by promoted IAS officers.Meanwhile, Bihar's decision to recall a dozen IAS officers of state cadre from central deputation too has cut little ice, as the concerned departments in the Centre have reportedly refused to relieve these officers for parent cadre.No wonder, many IAS officers in Bihar have been tasked with additional postings.

In fact, few officers have now been tasked to look after as many as three responsibilities. Bihar government sources concede that a good number of cabinet decisions despite backed by proper budgetary allocations could not see the light of the day in the state because the delivery mechanism was inadequately manned.

This is not all. Since the state government is explicitly committed to fulfil its promises on the welfare fronts, it requires more IAS officers to oversee a number of World Bank, and the state government initiated welfare oriented projects.

The trouble is they have none.While a number of other states have negotiated similar scarcity of IAS officers by assigning the subordinate civil service personnel with additional responsibilities, Bihar does not really have that option in hand because it is woefully short on this front as well.

No wonder, the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) is currently holding recruitment tests for appointing five batches of deputy collectors in one go. Similarly, Jharkhand too doesn't have enough bureaucrats to take charge of its departments.

And those who are there are burdened with too much. About 20 officials of the Jharkhand cadre have gone on central deputation.

A few of the IAS officers are on study leave. Jharkhand personnel department officials pin the blame on the Union Public service Commission (UPSC), saying it was delaying promotions in the state services.

"The problem is basically due to the delay in promoting state civil service officials. These promotions to the IAS cadre by the UPSC are pending since 2005 due to some wrangles," said an official. At least one Jharkhand state civil service officer—Promod Sharma, whose name was recommended for the IAS cadre—has already superannuated after a long but futile wait for his elevation. Jharkhand officials also point to an "unreasonable" state government which increased number of departments without taking into consideration the number of personnel available to man them.

"When the state was carved out of Bihar, there used to be less than 20 departments here. Now Jharkhand has about 30 departments but there aren't enough IAS officers to post in each department," said a bureaucrat. In a small state like Jharkhand, where Independents have considerable power and clout, the state government tends to succumb to various demands of its allies.

The net result is that more and more departments get created to please MLAs."Not all ministers get along with all IAS officers.

They (ministers) always insist that the chief minister post an officer of their choice to their department," said a Jharkhand officer. "No wonder many upright officers have been pushed into oblivion." Some irony this for the celebrated and highly touted steel frame.