Lateral entry into the bureaucracy will seek outside specialists, not work around the system
The Narendra Modi-led government has set the stage by inviting applications for 10 joint secretary positions for terms lasting three to five years.
In an article published in this newspaper in September 2000, ‘ Bringing Competition to Bureaucracy’, I had argued that increased complexity of policymaking required opening up of the top bureaucracy to outside specialists. I recommended, “Positions at the level of joint secretary and above should be filled by fully open competition. To ensure fairness in the process, the UPSC (Union Public Service Commission) can be entrusted with the task of administering the selections. When outside individuals are chosen, they may be brought on fixed terms of a suitable length.”
Two decades later, the government has set the stage for this important reform. It has invited applications for 10 joint secretary positions for terms lasting three to five years. Surprisingly, however, the majority of news stories have taken a sceptical view of the GoI announcement.
A key criticism has been that this is nothing new; lateral entry, most prominently of economists, has been a feature of our bureaucratic system for a long time. Numerous talented economists, beginning with I G Patel and Manmohan Singh, and ending with Arvind Subramanian and Sanjeev Sanyal, have held senior bureaucratic positions.