Ways to downsize bureaucracy

Given the number of times the government has ordered 10 per cent reductionsin its staff strength since Independence, the bureaucracy shoul...

Given the number of times the government has ordered 10 per cent reductionsin its staff strength since Independence, the bureaucracy should havevanished into thin air by now. In his first budget, Yashwant Sinha evenoffered to surrender one post of secretary under his charge. Since then theemployee strength has increased by more than a lakh and that of secretariesto the government by 17! Recently the ministry of telecommunications wassplit to accommodate the ambitions of two aspirants to the secretary8217;spost.

The problem with these percentage reductions is that they are totally ad hocin nature and bear no relation to the workload in a ministry. For instance,why should it be 10 per cent and not eight or 15 per cent? The last paycommission recommended an overall reduction of 30 per cent. But why 30 percent and not 40 per cent? As far as this 10 per-cent mantra is concerned, itis very easy to enforce. This is about the percentage of posts which arealways vacant in government departments and all that the secretary has to dois to list them out and file a compliance report!

The only rational way to downsize bureaucracy is to tackle the problem atthe structural level. All the ministries are structured on the same pattern.Once a paper is received in a department, it is processed through ninelevels before it lands on the table of the minister for final orders. Fourof these nine levels are clerical. Then there are five levels of officers.The most rational and effective way to reduce staff is to reduce the numberof these levels. Since work in the ministries is of a routine nature, whyshould a case pass through nine levels? Two clerical and two officer-levelprocessing should be more than enough, thus reducing the levels from nine tofour and cutting staff strength by at least 50 per cent. The proposed reformwould also make for efficient disposal of cases, release acres of officespace and reduce points of extortion and harassment to the public.

A number of ministries were created to deal with the public sectorundertakings. Ministries of steel, mines, civil aviation, shipping, tourism,among others, came into existence in the process. They mostly replicate thework done at the headquarters of the undertakings. This arrangement causesunnecessary delays in the clearance of projects. As the government isanswerable to Parliament regarding the performance of these corporations, amuch more rational and economical arrangement will be to have just oneministry of public undertakings, with small cells monitoring the working ofeach group of public corporations under the charge of a joint secretary.

With the help of well-trained staff this officer can handle Parliamentquestions, prepare performance reports, process financial sanctions, withoutgetting into the nitty-gritty of the working of the undertaking or breathingdown the neck of the technocrats.

The ministries and their field departments have gradually acquired the lookof the havelis of old zamindars. As the needs of the family increased, abedroom was added here, a sitting room there, and a bathroom somewhere else.Functionally, the sprawling structure of a haveli has little coherence andthere is a lot of wastage of space. Moreover, as the children grow up andmove out, the accommodation created for them remains in place, gatheringdust. Very much the same is the case with the ministries and their satelliteorganisations. They have been augmented from time to time to meet aparticular contingency. But once an addition is made, its usefulness isnever reviewed and no post ever abolished. So, like an old haveli, most ofthe ministries have little organisational coherence.

The most illogical aspect of the structure of these ministries is that allof them are organised on the same pattern. Now, how on earth can theministries of home, agriculture and civil aviation have similar organisationand systems of working? The ministry of home performs purely administrativefunctions. The ministry of agriculture has developmental functions and worksfor optimisation of agricultural production and promotion of agriculturalresearch. Despite their totally unrelated functions, they are organised onthe same pattern and their work culture is the same. What is worse, they aregoverned by the same office procedure and financial rules and regulationswhich, in any case, were framed nearly 80 years back.

The writer is former secretary, ministry of information andbroadcasting