Prime Minister Narendra Modi has pitched for export of defence
equipment. After dedicating aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya to the
nation on June 14, Modi reportedly stated: “Indian arms and ammunition should
be exported across the world and used by smaller nations to protect themselves.”
July 29, 2014
‘Development’ for the poor The subaltern perspective
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s governance agenda, unveiled by the
President in his address to Parliament on June 9, 2014, gives prime position to
pro-poor development: “My Government is dedicated to the poor. Poverty has no
religion, hunger has no creed, and despair has no geography.
MPs: Do’s and don’ts?
Every Member of Parliament has to make and
subscribe to an oath or affirmation, before taking his seat in Parliament, that
he will bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution, that he will uphold
the sovereignty and integrity of India and that he will faithfully discharge
the duty upon which he is about to enter.
Modi goes to Tokyo
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Tokyo soon to meet
with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, signalling closer bilateral ties infused by
personal chemistry and shared values. The Namo-Shinzo show will be an
elaborately choreographed red carpet extravaganza to highlight the two leaders’
warm bonds; after all they are Twitter buddies and met twice previously in 2007
and 2012.
Simplicity defines her
Meet
Sumitra Mahajan, 71, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP from Indore in Madhya
Pradesh and the second woman Speaker of the world’s biggest democracy’s
Parliament. Mahajan is no ordinary MP—she has won each and every Lok Sabha
election from Indore since first contesting from there in 1989. Moreover, she
is known for her simple lifestyle and spotless career.
Sunset for the Chogyal
I was having lunch when I got a call from Kewal Singh, the
foreign secretary, asking me to report to him immediately. It was April 7,
1973. I rushed to the foreign office. Kewal Singh, welcoming me warmly, said,
‘You are being sent to take over charge of the Sikkim government immediately.
The Sikkim administration has collapsed and the Chogyal (ruler) wants immediate
assistance. The people are on the streets, demanding a democratic system.
Lost somewhere in between!
here is what the
29-year-old Jaipur boy, Gaurav Agarwal, who topped in the UPSC exams in 2013,
had to say when media persons asked him why he wanted to become a civil
servant: “After finishing my studies in IIT and IIM, I worked in a top MNC in
Hong Kong for four years. It was a highly paid and comfortable job in the
investment banking sector but I decided to go for the civil services due to its
distinguished elements. I found that the job of a civil servant is more challenging
and very distinguished.
Governance, Modi ishtyle
narendra Modi is rewriting all the
established theories of governance. He started by coining the moolmantra
for his ishtyle as “minimum government, maximum governance”. Pundits are
even now trying hard to understand the esoteric meaning hidden in these four
innocent-looking words.
Wildlife thriller with a twist
at last, a new genre of tiger fiction or shall we
say wildlife fiction is created! After all the sombre reports about elections
won and lost, finally a more inspiring, gripping, nail-biting, edge-of-the-seat
mystery-thriller about wildlife, especially the perilously endangered
tiger.
Keep the faith
The sharp run-up in the market post the new government has made
investors, especially retail investors, a bit cautious. The bitter taste of the
recent past is not going easily and most retail investors seem to have missed
the bus as they still find it hard to believe in the likely turnaround of the
Indian economy. The rally has, therefore, been mainly triggered and carried by
FIIs’ belief in the Indian economy and the massive amount of cheap money
flowing in due to the comparative attractiveness of India vis-a-vis other
emerging economies. Indian investors with a cost of capital of around 10 per
cent still do not find the market worth investing in.
Love in the time of elections
The
so-called Raja of Madhya Pradesh and veteran Congress leader, Digvijaya Singh,
was tantalisingly embroiled in the controversy of an alleged love affair with
TV anchor Amrita Rai. The exposé took place bang in the middle of the
elections. It was a very prudent and shrewd decision by Digvijaya to
immediately tweet to the world that he had found his lady love. Even the media
had not expected that his alleged romance would be deliberately leaked on the
social media. Mediapersons were taken aback by this Cheeni Kum romance.
New system of governance
The process of governance by Narendra Modi has
begun. There are certain norms and procedures under which the Government of
India works. The most important Committee in the Government of India is the
Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC). It consists of three
decision-makers—the Prime Minister, Home Minister and the concerned Minister of
the Ministry.
The ways of Kamal Nath
Veteran Congress leader Kamal Nath was not only the Urban Development
Minister in the UPA II regime but also was virtually the de facto Chief
Minister of the National Capital Region as far as ‘colonisation’ was concerned.
Kamal Nath was the ex-officio Chairman of National Capital Region Planning
Board (NCRPB), being Minister of Urban Development. This is the body which
decides the development of the land in and around Delhi. The Chief Ministers of
Delhi, Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh are also members of the Board.
Files on hold
Whenever regimes have changed in the last 67 years, the transition has
been smooth, especially for facilitators. The BJP has come to power alone,
without the support of anybody’s crutches this time. This disposition has
created a bottleneck. As far as the bureaucracy is concerned, they have their
set-up in place. The issue is how to deal with the ministers’ offices. Barring
a few top industrialists’ facilitators, most are perturbed.
Of boys and men
The probationers of the IAS Academy at Mussoorie
who were originally from Allahabad were called ‘all bad boys’. Imagine the
scenario when ‘all bad boys’ and a good teacher who also hails from Allahabad
assembled to release a book! The teacher was BJP stalwart Murli Manohar Joshi
and the ‘boys’ were former Cabinet Secretary Prabhat Kumar and BK
Chaturvedi. The three were present on the occasion of the release of a
book written by MK Kaw, a retired IAS officer and a satirist for gfiles.
Kaw has published a compilation of his columns under the title KAW-COW and
Silly Point. Kaw has been using his wit for long and has been writing for The
Times of India under the title KAW-COW. Kaw invited his former boss,
Joshi, also former Human Resource Development Minister.
Debt-ridden, yet prosperous
Are you looking for a public relations manager
for your firm, ministry or company? There is an official in Delhi, who works in
a Gujarat-based public sector undertaking and is omnipresent in Delhi’s elite
clubs. The PSU has a full-fledged office with a guest house in the capital. gfiles
has a list of the who’s who of Delhi who have been beneficiaries of the
official’s benevolence.
Cheat sheet
If you are a Gujarat cadre officer and have
served the UPA II regime, there is no guarantee that you are protected and will
get a good posting. Everyone was shocked when recently, the Prime Minister’s
Office shifted a Secretary-rank officer from the finance ministry. As reported
in the media, Narendra Modi was aware of the officer’s proximity to the UPA II
regime’s important leader from Gujarat.
The perfect secretary
The post of Private Secretary to the minister is
considered so vital that whosoever sits in the seat is believed to virtually
rule the said ministry. The Private Secretary works as the connect between ministry
officials, the outside world and the minister.
A hegemon in the making
Modi has shown clear signs
of an emerging supreme ruler but how or
where he will really lead India is yet to be clearly seen
where he will really lead India is yet to be clearly seen
it was clear from the very beginning of this election campaign that
Narendra Modi is not a leader from the traditional mould. H s irise in the
party was phenomenal, his campaign was awesome, his speeches from the hustings
masterly and the majority he has won is simply staggering. His success in
securing the total submission of the many recalcitrant elements in the party
without even raising a finger or any bloodletting has been remarkable.
Dawn of a Naya Daur
Modi heralds change with Gandhi-Lohia-Upadhyay talisman
june 26, the day the Modi governmentcompleted a month in office, was
also the 39th anniversary of the beginning of the darkest period of the history
of the Republic of India—the 19 months of Emergency—which was also touted as ‘Anushasan
Parv’. The period between May 26, 2014, and June 26 also saw the
promulgation of discipline (anushasan), with government offices in New
Delhi witnessing the revival of governance. But this time draconian powers were
not used. The shasan of Narendra Damodar Modi ensured anushasan. The
leader has led by example.
July 10, 2014
Will Modi break the policy paralysis?
COVER
STORY
governance civil services
Bureaucracy in India is an
important arm to carry out the political mandate of an elected government. When
the programmes and policies are clearly defined in the bureaucratic set-up,
there is no confusion. Bureaucracy, the pivotal arm for programme
implementation, is happy when political masters own and direct the programmes
by signing the documents for implementation.
http://gfilesindia.com/frmArticleDetails.aspx?id=970&Name=COVER%20STORYA challenge for Modi
COVER
STORY
governancecivil services
by mg devasahayam
A
new government with new polity, new priorities, new hope and new promises, with
‘Governance for Development’ as its guiding principle, has assumed office. Only
a committed bulwark can carry out the arduous agenda. The dictionary meaning of
‘bulwark’ suggests “any institution or instrument giving strong support or
encouragement in time of need, danger, or doubt”. The new government needs such
a bulwark to respond to the ‘dangers and doubts’ that linger in many minds.
Among all the institutions and instruments in India’s governance framework, the
civil service is most suited for this assignment because it is the only one
that spans the country...
The ‘Single Directive’ and after
COVER
STORY
judgmentprabhatkumar
Even at
the cost of stating the obvious, it must be reiterated that, in a democratic
set-up, the political executive must take decisions and the permanent
bureaucracy tender its considered advice without fear or favour. Institutional
integrity requires the two components of the executive to discharge their
respective roles in the best interests of the people. It must also be
recognised that in the last few decades this well-acknowledged principle has
been given the go-by. The principle of political neutrality of the bureaucracy
has been compromised in several instances in the recent past.
‘4C and 1R’ syndrome
COVER STORY
reformcivil services
by Neeraj Mahajan
Despite
the mandate for change, Prime Minister NarendraModi is not going to find it
easy to contain price rise, inflation, fiscal deficit and subsidies. Also,
since power, education, and land acquisition are State subjects, his real
challenge will be to carry along the 17 States where the Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP) is not in power. Added to this is the fact that he does not have a
majority in the Rajya Sabha to implement new laws he would like.
India’s ‘Modi’fied governance
COVER STORY
visioncivil services
by MG Devasahayam
Within
four days of taking office, 10 priorities, 100-day agenda, no FDI in retail but
100 per cent in defence! This is what is called ‘hitting the ground running’
and ‘firing from all cylinders’—true style of Prime Minister NarendraModi as
brought out during the election campaign. The 10 priorities he has listed for
his government are..
Festering Sri Lanka: What should India do?
Governance
foreign policy mg devasahayam
riding the
crest of an emphatic mandate, Prime Minister NarendraModi has taken charge and
has hit the ground running. The Union Cabinet has been put together. On the
domestic front, Special Investigation Team (SIT) has been formed to hunt down
the black money, its hoarders and launderers. Ministers are busy dusting files
and formulating a development-driven governance agenda.
Bringing tourism back on track
Governance
policyashwanilohani
at this crucial
juncture in the life of the nation, it is of essence that the national
perspective on tourism does not remain confined merely to figures of foreign
tourist arrivals—figures that conceal more than they actually reveal.
Another fallacy is related to promotional advertising. Our sheer inability
to appreciate that the bottleneck in so far as foreign tourist arrivals is
concerned, is not the inability to showcase but the excessive load factors on
the flights plying between our country and the rest of the world. Hopefully,
the momentum to create large airports shall continue as only that will impact
the numbers in the real sense.
http://gfilesindia.com/frmArticleDetails.aspx?id=975&Name=GOVERNANCEIron or Reed?Tale of Two Lady Officers
GOVERNANCE
civil service rules
by MG Devasahayam
the
cliché ‘women’s empowerment’ has been the flavour of the season, mouthed ad
nauseam by the ‘heir to the dynasty’ who has lost his ‘throne’. But
here are two instances where ‘highly empowered women’ were dis-empowered and
made to face severe embarrassment. This is the tale of two lady officers of the
All-India Services (AIS) that brings out the malfunctioning of the Appointments
Committee of the Cabinet (ACC), incompetence of the Department of Personnel and
Training (DoPT) and arbitrariness of the State Governments—reducing the iron
frame to a mere reed!
Chanakya in Modi’s team
Mastermind
ajitdoval / karankharb
With
Prime Minister NarendraModi assuming office after a blitzkrieg electoral
offensive that saw the Congress and its allies vanquished as never before, the
dishonest and inefficient bureaucrats in South and North Blocks are scurrying
for cover. At the same time, there are officers of unimpeachable integrity and
enormous potential who were thus far ignored by a scam-ridden, dysfunctional
regime headed by a gentleman who will perhaps be remembered as the most unheard
and unseen Prime Minister of India.
House for all seasons
INITIATIVE
housinggovernment
by NarendraKaushik
The name ‘General Pool Residential
Accommodation’ (GPRA) is a misnomer. The 110-acre-plus GPRA, located in the
heart of New Delhi right on the periphery of Lutyens' Bungalow Zone (LBZ), is
not just a white-painted, high-ceiling and gated complex where the high and
mighty of three arms of a democracy—civil services, judiciary and political
executive—are housed. It is the first certified government project under green
homes, which contributes zero discharge to Delhi’s municipal waste, taps solar
energy to light its tiled and bitumen-laid streets and heat water for bathing
and is self-sufficient...
Developing oneself
MY
CORNER
self-helpamitabhthakur
recently a certain occasion warranted me to
go to Ranchi to see my younger brother, Avinash Kumar, who is an IAS officer in
Jharkhand. There, a large number of IAS and IPS officers came to meet him, with
whom we had long interactions. All these officers were energetic and talented,
but two officers made a very distinct mark on me. One was Kamal NayanChaube and
the other K KKhandelwal.Chaube is an IPS officer and
in that capacity he is expected to be an expert in the field of policing...
D-Day Musings
SILLY POINT
electionsmkkaw
A
few days ago, when the exit poll figures were being touted from the housetops,
one morning, around 4 a.m., I had a vivid dream. I dreamt that the NDA had won
five-sevenths of the seats in the 16thLok Sabha. NarendraModi was so
euphoric that he decided to request the President to allow the new Council of
Ministers to take their oath of office at Nagpur, in the benign presence of the
Sarsanghachalak of the RSS.
Good days are here
STOCK DOCTOR
drgssood
Akhirachhey
din aa hi gaye (good days are finally
here), at least for the market for now. And I am of the firm belief that a
positive cycle may well get triggered with the buoyancy in the market that
helps the sentiment to turn positive, enabling the political set-up to take
some bold measures that get translated into positive economic and corporate
numbers and so on. Though the market may have run too much too soon and there
may be a sharp correction waiting to happen soon, most analysts across the
world are of the view that the Indian market is now in for a secular bull run.
Choose your karma
PERSPECTIVE
karmasadhguru
One day
I happened to be driving with an affluent person in a particular town. We
started talking about the abject poverty in the area. He shrugged and said, “It
is these people’s karma. They must have done something bad in the past
to deserve this.” I cautioned him, saying, “Economic well-being and
impoverishment are caused by a complex set of factors.” But he went on about
how the poor deserved their lot. Ironically
Jignesh’s ‘shady’ connections
SCAM
nselmoney trail
The great gambler of the National Spot
Exchange Ltd (NSEL), Jignesh Shah, is in jail. But when will the investors, who
invested their hard-earned earnings in the NSEL, get their money back? It is in
public domain now that Shah manipulated the trading and siphoned off investors’
money. gfiles exposed the scam in its June, September and November 2013 issues.
Two top-ranking ministers were behind the scam, so nothing moved. But the
moment the Lok Sabha elections were announced, law...
Profiling a low-profile leader
BOOK
REVIEW
politics biography
by
ASHOK MOHAN
AMIDST the
recent avalanche of books on politicians of different hues, a very low-profile
politician has also made the grade. A maiden biographical sketch of the BJP’s
emerging hero, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, documents the rise of the low-profile
leader and the simultaneous growth of Madhya Pradesh.Shivraj Singh and Rise
of Madhya Pradesh throws adequate light on how MP was administered in
the...
No pests allowed
What
will you do in a situation when mosquitoes have infested your office and home?
Obviously, you will find mosquito repellents to drive them away. If the office
and home belong to NarendraModi, even mosquitoes will have to think before
entering. An American company has invented a very effective mosquito repellent.
This repellent is called NOMOS. The oil used in this repellent is made in
Tanzania.
Welcome back, Hindi!
Barring
four or five ministers who are from South India, almost 90 per cent of the
cabinet is from the Hindi heartland. Everybody viewed them on TV, taking their
oaths in Hindi in the name of God. So far so good. But it was a peculiar
situation when the new ministers took charge of their respective ministries;
they called the officers and took briefs. The officers understood the need of
the hour and quickly adopted the tune of the new dispensation.
Sholay act of Dharmendra
WhenDharmendra,
the cine star, contested the election from Bikaner, he only invited his sons
for campaigning and not his wife, HemaMalini, who was a Rajya Sabha member
then. She also did the same when she contested the Lok Sabha election this year
from Mathura. She did not invite Dharmendra for campaigning. Apparently,
HemaMalini was actually puzzled that her family members wanted to visit Mathura
and campaign for her. She politely declined. But Dharmendra was unstoppable...
‘Advance’ down the drain
Kamal
Nath,
the Minister for Urban Development in the outgoing government, is known as a
fast-track minister. He demands timely delivery from his officials. Kamal Nath
is reputedly so fast that even while fighting elections from Chhindwara in
Madhya Pradesh, he was regularly addressing different administrative issues. It
is a set rule that the top contractors in the State persuade the political
dispensation to pursue the case of the Central Scheme so that work can be
allotted to them later. The contractors offer advance money to the concerned
ministers.
Mystery man BaldevBeri
Is the Haryana
Government facing a human resource crunch? If not, then why are many officers
in the Chief Minister’s secretariat being given extensions? Either Chief
Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda does not know how to run the administration or
he is under unknown pressures to keep certain people in posts. If not, why has
Hooda given an extension to his Officer on Special Duty, Baldev Raj Beri, even
after retirement? Why is Beri so important to Hooda? Beri, who hails from
Kanher village, is part of every ruling system in the state. He is a simple administrative
officer but managed to get inducted in the Haryana Civil Services.
http://gfilesindia.com/frmArticleDetails.aspx?id=962&Name=...by%20the%20wayThe price of integrity
What happens when a
serving officer is trapped in intra-department rivalries? This scenario befell
a senior officer, Anup Kumar Srivastava, of Customs and Central Excise at
Delhi.The mafia of some powerful but corrupt superintendents and inspectors of
the department in Delhi, in a nexus with some tax-evaders, could not tolerate
his initiatives. When Srivastava initiated a vigilance inquiry against them and
transferred them from the Commissioner ate on complaints of extortion received
from the trade, a vengeful conspiracy was hatched to falsely implicate him with
the intention of removing him from the post of Commissioner, C. Excise,
Delhi-1.
Forward looking secretaries
When the nation was
gripped by election fever, government offices in the Capital looked deserted.
Most of the officers were deputed on election duty and were away from the
Capital. But the Secretaries remain in Delhi, and some utilised this time well.
The Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Ashish Bahuguna, acted on his own as he
was aware of the rough weather forecast this year. He called on all the additional
secretaries, joint secretaries and chief secretaries to have an on-the-spot
assessment of the crop yield and preparedness of the states this year...
http://gfilesindia.com/frmArticleDetails.aspx?id=964&Name=...by%20the%20wayOath ceremony sans secretaries
The
15th Prime Minister of India, NarendraDamodardasModi, took his oath in style.
Most of the guests were invitees of his choice. The complete list of guests was
drawn up by the BJP top brass and Modi’s advisers. Even the senior most
officers, except the staff of the President of India, were not aware of who had
been invited. The President of India’s office and Modi’s officials interacted
regularly for the function. As it appears now, it was more or less a political
function, rather than a government function...
http://gfilesindia.com/frmArticleDetails.aspx?id=965&Name=...by%20the%20way
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