Article Review-17: Bhattacharjee, Jay (2005): Reading English August: Flatulent Babus Need To Be Accountable, The Times of India, New Delhi, February 11, Friday, p-18, edit page.
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In response to a civil servant’s call for inculcating “a set of core values,” Bhattacharjee* says that that the Indian civil servants do have a “deeply ingrained set of core values, namely,
self-aggrandisement, turf protection, non-accountability and a quasi-divine right to rule over hapless citizens.” He, therefore suggests safeguards “like accountability, performance monitoring, compensation to linked to efficiency and citizen’s redress against bureaucratic malfunctioning.”
This is a familiar diatribe against the civil servants. The author even challenges some protection civil servants have against anonymous, false or frivolous complaints and many careers are known to have been ruined on this account alone. The suggestions made by the author are also in place. However, the writer is right in saying that the value of “public service” among the civil servants is missing. The question to be asked then is: “What can be done to improve the public service delivery for which the public has a very poor experience, often bordering on harassment? The answer may thus lie in addressing the question of public service delivery and e-government can be one promising way.
Dr D.C.Misra
February 12, 2005.
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*Bhattacharjee, Jay (2005): Reading English August: Flatulent Babus Need To Be Accountable, The Times of India, New Delhi, February 11, Friday, p-18, edit page,
http://epaperdaily.timesofindia.com/Daily/skins/TOI/navigator.asp? Daily=CAP (accessed: February 12, 2005).
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