Ever a tyrant

Rajan Kashyap

Why is the Department of Finance of a government so feared and loathed?

 In a democracy the primary function of any state government is to serve the people who vote it to power.  For fulfilling its lofty objectives the government has to be assured of adequate money. The authority to spend is granted by the state legislature. In our country the budgets announce glamorous schemes and projects to benefit every voter in town or village, but frequently fail to provide funds for the purpose.

Years ago I was perchance assigned responsibility in the Finance Department. Earlier I, along with many others, viewed FD with a cynical eye.  We thought the department was obstructionist and inhuman. It denied   the release of allowances and funds even for basic needs. I recalled the words of William Shakespeare,

“O, it is excellent/ To have a giant’s strength, but to use it like a giant/ Is tyrannous.”

 Exercising untrammelled power, FD showed the typical characteristics of a tyrant. This was my considered opinion. 

 Once I became a part of the establishment, I began to appreciate the compulsions under which the institution was expected to function. Basically the problem was of too much expenditure, too little income. The minister’s announcement that there would be “no new taxes this year” was, of course,  greeted with applause. Few outside FD cared to heed a proviso, concealed in superfine print, that “suitable resource mobilisation would be undertaken in due course”.  By such sleight of hand an attempt was made to please all. If the promised revenues did not materialise, the coffers ran dry.  In desperate situations, spending had to be curtailed. I now changed my tune altogether. In Shakespeare’s words again, I defended FD as “more sinned against than sinning.”

 In all innocence, we tried some small measures to show that FD too had a humane face. At that time, many employees had to wait for months after they had retired before their pension and other benefits were paid to them. Noting that the impediment was merely procedural, the minster ordered that every retiring employee of the state would be given his dues on the very date of retirement. The beneficiaries were pleased. Even the staff of the Finance Department was enthusiastic. Almost excessively enthusiastic, it transpired, as this painful incident demonstrates.

Shortly after the government's decision to facilitate the release of dues to retirees, it happened that a dear colleague from my civil service met a sudden, untimely death, at a young age, when he was at the peak of his career.  At the bhog ceremony, a service to commemorate the departed soul, where friends and relatives had congregated, I recognised a middle-level functionary of the Finance Department. I became suspicious to observe a large handbag that he was carrying.  On my questioning the man stated proudly that he was carrying in cash the entire benefits to which the wife of the departed officer had become entitled after the sad demise of her husband. The FD’s representative felt that he was displaying due compassion, in terms of the recent policy decision, to deliver the dues in public. Fortunately, I was able to avert all-round embarrassment on such a solemn occasion that a callous faux pas would have created.  I learnt an unexpected lesson from this morbid episode. How difficult it is for an institution to mend its image of a tyrant, and suddenly present its humane face!