Merit supersession will take us nowhere

Keki Daruwalla

When handling civil services (mostly ‘subordinate’), the British had their own problems. There were lobbies to contend with — not just  feudal zamindars but also ‘martial’ races and castes, and the loyalists who had fought in the Great War and in 1857. Remember the Indian soldiers who had followed ‘Nikel Sen’ (Brig-Gen Nicholson) in the assault on Delhi? And there was the Hindu-Muslim divide always.

Admitted that for three decades after 1857, British ire was directed more against  Muslims. Later, things evened out. When in the second decade of the 20th century the Crown wanted to start recruiting Indians as magistrates and Deputy Superintendents, there was a storm of protest from Muslims and Hindus. Indians can’t be trusted in high positions, they will be biased, sectarian, was the argument. The British devised a safe method — seniority. Once you go by seniority, you can’t go wrong, can’t be accused of favouritism. The Indian Government after 1947 fell for this, hook, line and sinker. This was so especially with regard to the defence forces and the judiciary. The army chief’s appointment went by seniority, except when Lieut-Gen Sinha missed the bus on the specious plea (never articulated) that he was too close to Jayaprakash Narayan. Now General Rawat, during the BJP dispensation, has superseded two seniors for reasons beyond our ken.

The services officers had a host of exams and training courses to go through where they were evaluated. There was the Wellington Staff College and the NDC where the best were earmarked, ignoring  their ranking  when  passing out of the IMA. Not so in the civil — and I include the police. Some of them just sat and sat and hey presto became senior!

Incidentally, a ministry in the days of the Raj consisted of a Secretary and a Deputy Secretary. Joint Secretaries intervened later. Now Additional and Special Secretaries outnumber the chaprasis (recruitment to Class IV being banned). When Hindi was introduced forcibly in UP in the 1970s, I asked a friend how a particular officer with minimal knowledge of Devanagari would fare. He answered: “Since the fellow just signs his name whether the file is going up or cascading down, he has nothing to worry.”

Of course there are scores of officers who have done innovative work, changed life for the better in districts and stood up against arbitrary policies/decisions. Most of them also manage to reach the top — more by accident than design. But so do the no-gooders. And very often a good officer plays second fiddle to the other kind.

The police of course are the worse. Here non-action is combined with over-zealous action on behalf of the party in power. In UP, the police was for the Yadavs when Mulayam Singh was CM and for the SCs when Mayawati was CM. Now under Yogi’s dispensation, the police is anti-Montague, the house to which Romeo belonged in medieval Verona. And they must be pro-vigilantes. It must be hard work after nightlong ‘encountering with criminals.’ But the best bits of the Lucknow police scene are the shining flag cars of DIGs, IGs, ADGs and that of the DG, truly a sight for sore eyes.

It needs to be remembered that the space for merit, whether admission to medical and engineering colleges or other prestigious institutions or getting a government job, has been reduced to half because of the reservation policy. Reservation has done a lot of good for the historically disadvantaged. But the space for merit has shrunk. This has affected religious minorities, who are barred from reservation. No wonder Justice Rajinder Sachar report stated clearly that Muslims were worse off than the SCs and STs.

Merit must be nursed. It will check the exodus to the US and the West. The earlier seniority is given second place to merit, the better for governance. I was saddened by the government’s ‘arguments’ asking the SC Collegium to reconsider its recommendation of elevating Justice KM Joseph, CJ of the Uttarakhand  High Court, to the Supreme Court. We all know what a brilliant judgment he delivered against the Presidential takeover of the state under Article 356. Eleven CJs of High Courts were ‘senior’ to Justice Joseph, the government said. There is no point going into the politics behind this charade. Yes he was ranked 41st among High Court Justices. But he was ‘seeded’ first by the Collegium. The Law Minister and the party needs to be told, “We don’t want the seniormost, Sir. We simply want the best.”