Modi means business – India’s new prime minister is determined to live up to his reputation for smart governance by issuing clear instructions to the bureaucracy to fast-track decision-making. Typically, even as he begins to cut the red tape involved in official processes, he has decided to focus on evolving a clean, hygienic environment for the government officials.
Clearly appalled by the sight of old cupboards stacked with dusty files in the passages of the government offices, the prime minister sent out a note to the Union Secretaries shortly after interacting with them on June 4, listing 11 directives to ensure “an improved work culture an work environment including hygiene and cleanliness of the work space.”
The note stated, “Passages and stairs should be cleaned to make them unobstructed and no office material/almirah etc. should be found in these spaces. Inside the rooms too, the files/papers etc. should be stacked neatly so that a positive work environment is created.”
In order to reduce the bureaucratic layers of decision-making, Mode has also asked each department to identify ten redundant rules/processes and dispense them. Similarly, secretaries have also been asked to shorten forms to a page, wherever possible so that decision-making is reduced to a maximum of four layers.
The note also instructs officials to weed out documents and files within three-four weeks “in accordance with the rules of record keeping, including digitization, wherever necessary.” According to the central government’s rulebook, recorded files are to be kept for a period of no more than a year and the other files are to be weeded unless there are enough reasons for retaining them.
Among other instructions, Mode has also asked the union secretaries to resolve public grievances on time and employ Information and communications technology (ICT) while submitting any information.
Each department has been asked to analyze the goals set for the five-year period, 2009-14 and note their current status which should then be presented to Prime Minister Mode in a PowerPoint presentation. The 11 directions are to be followed on an urgent basis.
In forging a new result-oriented governance at the Centre, Mode has leveraged his experience of working closely with bureaucracy to deliver on the development agenda in Gujarat, India’s western state which he had helmed as chief minister for more than a decade. In Gujarat, Modi was known for giving full freedom to his trusted bureaucrats to execute the governance agenda.
In his interaction with secretaries, Mode had also assured the bureaucracy of protection against malicious prosecution for bona fide decisions and made it clear that secretaries to the government can approach him or mail him directly with inputs and ideas on any issue for deciding matters quickly.
Mode’s call for faster decision-making stands out in sharp contrast to the labyrinthine functioning of bureaucracy and political structures under the Manmohan Singh administration, which had earned a dubious reputation for policy paralysis.
In a taste of things to come, the Cabinet secretary has instructed government departments to reduce the number of layers a file passes through to four and refer disputes to the Prime Minister’s Office or Cabinet secretariat to cut down on unnecessary delays.
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