From Sabha to the Constitution: Civilisational Roots, Colonial Experiments, Epigraphical Evidence, and the Urgent Renewal of Village Democracy in India

Introduction

India represents the longest continuous civilisational experiment in decentralised governance in world history. Long before the emergence of the modern nation-state, Indian villages functioned as autonomous political, judicial and economic communities. Decentralisation in India is not an imported administrative device but a civilisational principle grounded in dharma, duty, and community. 

Village Democracy as India’s Governance DNA  

The dominant narrative of democracy locates its origins in the Greek city-state, Roman republicanism, or modern European constitutionalism. India followed a distinctly different trajectory. Here, democracy did not emerge from urban assemblies or aristocratic estates; it arose from the village. For more than two millennia, Indian villages governed land, irrigation, revenue, justice, education, charity, and social order through dharmic local assemblies rather than centralised state bureaucracies.

Charles Metcalfe famously described Indian villages as “little republics, having nearly everything that they want within themselves”. Unlike Western political systems that concentrated sovereignty in the state, Indian political life distributed sovereignty across thousands of local dharmic communities.

The Classical Foundations: Sabha, Panchayat, and Dharma  

Ancient Indian governance operated through sabhas (deliberative assemblies) and panchayats (judicial–administrative councils). These were not informal bodies but legally recognised corporate institutions owning property, enforcing contracts, regulating commons, and adjudicating disputes.

Panchayats functioned as the grassroots tier of judicial authority, settling most civil and social disputes without reference to royal courts. The king was not the daily administrator of society but the custodian of dharma.

Dharma served as the ethical foundation of this decentralised order. Unlike modern legality, which depends on coercive enforcement, dharmic governance relied on shared moral obligation and social consensus. Compliance was secured through legitimacy rather than surveillance.

Epigraphical Foundations of Village Self-Governance  

Beyond textual sources, India’s decentralised governance system is **directly attested through hundreds of temple and land-grant inscriptions**, making it one of the best-documented pre-modern local governance traditions in the world.

The Uttaramerur Inscription (c. 920–930 CE)  

The most famous documentary evidence of village democracy is found in the Vaikuntha Perumal Temple inscriptions at Uttaramerur (Tamil Nadu), issued during the reigns of Parantaka I and subsequent Chola rulers. These inscriptions provide a complete constitutional blueprint of village governance.

They record:

- Ward-wise village organisation (kudumbu system)

- Electoral selection through Kudavolai (lottery)

- Strict eligibility qualifications (property ownership, Vedic education, tax compliance)

- Severe disqualifications (corruption, moral misconduct, audit failure)

- Functional committees for irrigation, tanks, justice, temples, revenue, and charity

- Mandatory public auditing of accounts

- Rotation, recall, and disbarment mechanisms

Other Major Epigraphical Records of Local Governance  

1. Chola Nadu Tank Committees – Inscriptions from Tirukkalukkunram, Tiruvallur, and Tiruchirapalli record technical irrigation committees with punishment for negligence.  

2. Karnataka Brahmadeya and Devadana Inscriptions – Village assemblies managing tax exemptions, water rights, and temple economies.  

3. Andhra Satavahana and Ikshvaku Inscriptions – Local guilds and village arbitration councils (nigamas and gramikas).  

4. Western Indian Copper Plate Grants (Guptas, Maitrakas) – Autonomous village land administration and dispute settlements.  

5. Kerala Temple Sabha Inscriptions – Deeply decentralised temple–village financial governance networks.

Together, these records confirm that:

- Villages possessed corporate legal identity

- Assemblies exercised judicial, fiscal, and administrative authority

- Governance was procedural, rule-bound, and audited

- Power was distributed, not centralised

The Chola Kudavolai System: Ethical Electoral Governance  

The Kudavolai system described above represents one of the most sophisticated pre-modern electoral systems in world history. Candidates were selected through lottery only after clearing strict moral, educational, fiscal, and social qualifications. Disqualifications included corruption, abuse of office, financial irregularities, and moral misconduct. Committees managed irrigation, land revenue, justice, temple administration, and public works under strict public audit.

This system integrated:

- Moral filtration  

- Randomised anti-factional selection  

- Continuous public accountability  

- Term limits and recall  

Modern democracies continue to struggle to achieve this combination simultaneously.

Colonial Disruption and the Dismantling of Village Sovereignty  

British colonial rule fundamentally disrupted India’s decentralised equilibrium. Through the Permanent Settlement, Ryotwari, and Mahalwari systems, land revenue was centralised, and villages were converted into instruments of extraction rather than self-governing communities.

Village courts were weakened, customary law delegitimised, and Panchayats reduced to advisory bodies. Maine himself later lamented that the village institutions which had survived centuries of political upheaval were severely weakened under modern administrative centralisation (Maine, 1871).

Early Twentieth-Century Revival Experiments  

A. The Aundh Experiment (1939–48)  

The princely state of Aundh adopted the most radical decentralisation experiment in modern India. Through the Aundh Panchayat Constitution (1939), the ruler voluntarily transferred all authority—administrative, fiscal, and judicial—to elected village panchayats. The state existed only as a federation of self-governing villages. Gandhi described it as the closest living embodiment of Gram Swaraj.

B. Baroda State Reforms (Sayajirao Gaekwad III)  

Baroda pioneered compulsory education, village courts, local boards, and decentralised administration between 1900–1930, building institutional capacity long before Independence.

C. Maratha & Princely State Experiments  

Kolhapur, Indore, and Mysore expanded village self-governance in sanitation, education, public health, and legal access.

D. Bengal & Chittagong Local Self-Government Acts (1919–1930s)  

The Montagu–Chelmsford reforms institutionalised district and union boards across Bengal and eastern India.

E. Travancore & Cochin (Kerala)  

Kerala’s later democratic depth drew directly from early village institutions in health, education, and land governance developed during the princely period.

Gandhi’s Gram Swaraj and Moral Decentralisation  

For Gandhi, swaraj meant ethical self-rule, not mere administrative devolution. Political power without self-restraint produced exploitation. True freedom required villages to be economically self-reliant, politically autonomous, and morally disciplined (Gandhi, 1909/1938). Authority was inseparable from service.

The 73rd Constitutional Amendment as Civilisational Restoration  

The 73rd Amendment (1992) constitutionally recognised Panchayats as “institutions of self-government,” establishing the Gram Sabha as the foundation of rural democracy. While framed as a technical reform, it represents a delayed civilisational restoration of India’s ancient village sovereignty.

Rudolph and Rudolph (1987) interpret this as the re-emergence of “negotiated authority,” where modern institutions operate through continuous engagement with social traditions rather than their displacement.

Diagnosis: Structural Weaknesses of Contemporary Panchayati Raj  

Despite constitutional status, today’s Panchayats suffer from:

1. Limited fiscal autonomy  

2. Misalignment of functions, funds, and functionaries  

3. Ritualised rather than deliberative Gram Sabhas  

4. Weak administrative capacity  

5. Elite capture and micro-clientelism  

6. Fragmented accountability  

7. Disconnection from moral legitimacy  

8. Collapse of local dispute resolution  

9. Short planning horizons  

10. Weak enforcement of social audits  

Reforming Panchayati Raj: A Civilisationally Anchored Framework  

Immediate Measures  

Mandatory Gram Sabha clearance, enforceable social audits, Kudavolai-inspired committee selection, commons registries, village mediation panels.

Medium-Term Reforms  

Statutory 3F alignment, own-source revenues, performance-linked grants, Panchayat secretariats, women’s leadership pipelines.

Long-Term Structural Reforms  

Village judicial systems, decentralised education governance, binding State Finance Commissions, constitutional clarity on village powers.

These align closely with Ostrom’s core principles of durable self-governance.

Conclusion: From Stone Inscriptions to Constitutional Law  

From the stone pillars of Uttaramerur to the text of the Indian Constitution, India’s decentralised governance tradition reveals an uninterrupted civilisational memory of village sovereignty. Ancient sabhas, epigraphical Panchayat constitutions, Chola electoral ethics, Aundh, Baroda, Gandhian Swaraj, and the 73rd Amendment together affirm one truth:  

Indian democracy is strongest when it flows upward from the village, not downward from the state.

Its renewal today is not nostalgia—it is institutional realism grounded in two millennia of governance practice.

Repository of good write ups on State, Politics and Policy Making by Bṛhat's Dhiti website

 Here's a list of articles from Bṛhat's Dhiti website on State, Politics, and Policy Making.
Very helpful.


1. The State and Its Governance - Insights from Śāstra:

 
https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/state-and-its-governance-insights-from-shastra 

2. Book Review | The Revolt of the Public by Martin Gurri:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/revolt-of-the-republic-review 

3. The Codification and Secularization of Hindu Law:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/codificationoflaw3

4. Codification of Law in India, Part 1:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/codificationoflaw1

5. Sāmatvārtha Part 1 - the Vision and Mission:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/samatvartha

6. Sāmatvārtha Part 2 - Monetary Localism for India that is Singapore and Africa:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/samatvartha2

7. Sāmatvārtha Part 3 - Tryst with Taxation, Welfare, and Urbanism:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/samatvartha3

8. Making the Invisible Visible: Resurgence of Culture in Shaping Public Policy:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/cultureinpolicy

9. On Statecraft - Madhava Rao’s Hints on the Art and Science of Government:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/onstatecraftmadhavarao

10. Adaptive Political Economy and Indian Knowledge Systems:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/adaptive-political-economy-and-indian-knowledge-systems

11. Precolonial History of the Dharmaśāstras:

https://www.brhat.in/dhiti/codificationoflaw2

Equity in Policy: Addressing socio-economic disparities and ensuring inclusivity by Dhwanii Pandit

Equity is one of the four pillars of a policy other than protection, labor and benefit (National Academy of Social Insurance, 2022). The world today is rooted in diversities which exist at all levels ranging from ethnicity to education. Hence, the agents of the governments today all across the world aim at making policies equitable and inclusive along with the constant eye on its implementation.

Socio economic disparities are double-edged sword. While on one hand, they can provide an opportunity for innovation & wealth creation, on the other hand, they often perpetuate inequality & poverty.

One of the foremost areas for equity in policy making is gender. Despite significant progress, gender disparities still persist across the globe, with women and gender minorities facing barriers in development. The recent Taliban’s oppression of women is prime example. Hence, policies like equal pay legislations, paternal leaves, gender quotas make a way for development. India’s Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, 2023 sets an example of women reservation in the legislature.

Education is another cornerstone of equity. Access to quality education is often the first step in achieving social and economic mobility, yet disparities in educational opportunities based on socio-economic status, geography, and gender continue to hold back millions. To ensure equitable education, policies must focus on providing inclusive curricula, addressing gaps in access, and ensuring that all children, regardless of background, are given the tools they need to succeed for example the Right to Education (RTE) under article 21 of the Indian Constitution

Equitable access to healthcare is a fundamental human right, but unequal distribution of resources and services continues to create vast disparities in health outcomes. Addressing health equity requires improving healthcare access, reducing financial barriers, and ensuring culturally competent care for all populations. Norway’s healthcare system promotes equity through universal coverage and equitable resource distribution.

At the workplace, equity is critical to creating environments where all individuals can contribute and succeed. Discriminatory practices, unequal pay, and lack of diversity in leadership roles are just some of the challenges that persist. Implementing policies that promote inclusive hiring practices, provide equal pay for equal work, and ensure safe and supportive work environments are essential steps toward achieving workplace equity. Canada is known for prioritizing equity laws supporting inclusive hiring practices.

Another form of equity that needs to be determined is in land leasing. For instance, post-independence India faced significant inequities in land and tenancy, as efforts like the abolition of zamindari and land redistribution were unevenly implemented, benefiting large landlords while marginalizing tenants and landless farmers. Land leasing acts are required to improve agricultural efficiency and equity, access to land by the landless and semi-landless poor, occupational diversity and for accelerated rural growth and transformation. The most prominent example can be of the Model Agricultural Land Leasing Act, 2016 prepared by NITI AAYOG in India. It serves as a guide for the States and UTs to draft their own piece of leasing legislation on the basis of the model law, keeping in view the local requirement.

Hence, countries today have been trying to include the sustainable development goals like Gender Equality, Good Health & Well Being etc. for policymaking. As it is rightly said, 

                  “Equity is the soul of public policy; without it, just remains a distant dream”

The author is a Policy Research Intern @IISPPR (International Institute of SDG's and Public Policy Research)

Register for the "Bhikshavritti' Festival this December at Jeevika Ashram in Madhya Pradesh!

 Invitation: The Bhikshavritti Utsav!

27-28-29 December, 2024

Jeevika Ashram, Indrana, Jabalpur, M.P.

Dear friends,

In India every region has had a world of performing arts. It is said that in our country, ‘har kos pe paani badle aur chaar kos pe vaani.’ Similarly, the style and flavour of dance, song and story also varied with geography, producing thousands of artistic traditions including some widely recognised names like the Manganiyar, Patta-chitra and Behroopiya. And unlike the modern economy, where the artist must struggle for survival, there was also a different kind of economic order in which these traditions thrived.

This is a warm invitation to the Bhikshavritti Utsav at Jeevika Ashram later this month, which will celebrate the performing traditions and the socio-economic order that helped them thrive. Artists from Karnataka, Maharashtra, Telangana, Rajasthan, Bengal and MP will be gathering for this three day festival in the heart of rural MP, half an hour from the city of Jabalpur. Elders who have worked with the artist communities of these traditions will also be present to help us understand the historical and present contexts of the traditions.

To see more information, including the tentative schedule, and register for the festival, please see this link: 

https://forms.gle/SqT9PH1MmcRQUFd37

Inviting Submissions from Followers of this Blog!

Greetings to one and all!

Inviting submissions for articles/posts on this blog from our lovely followers.

Please drop a message through the 'Contact form' button at the bottom of this blog to submit your articles/posts, which will be published on this Blog.

Looking forward to receiving your submissions! All the best.

Indian Bureaucracy a legacy of British Colonialism By Binod Singh

 The bureaucrats in India are called "Babu" in Hindi which also means father in the same language. They enjoy a father-like status across the country since the colonial era. In the independent India, they are credited with holding back the Indian economy for more than four decades by curtailing the entrepreneurial spirit of many Indians.

In fact India has been performing very poor until recently when it comes to economic freedom. People do enjoy the freedom to speak but not to start their own business. Politicians come and go after five years or so with few exceptions but a "Babu" retires after his full term and no one can fire him without running a trial at one of the lengthiest judicial court of India where one case may take 20 years to be disposed.

When China was liberated in 1949 it almost got rid of the old system and totally created a new bureaucracy from top to bottom. As the famous saying of chairman Mao goes: xian da sao fang jian. zai qing ke". Clean the house before inviting guests.

But the case was just the opposite in India. The country inherited an administration which was created by its British rulers to serve the interest of their Queen and the British parliament. The whole set of Indian Civil Services was designed and trained by the British with the aim of extracting maximum revenues from the local Indians. The same was the case with the Indian army which was trained to sing the song "Long live the Queen".

India's red-tapism started under the colonial rule when then British government held competitive examination in London to select some of the smart Indians to work as servants of British government. Now after 63 years of Indian independence, the country's native rulers have not much tempered with the colonial legacy gifted to them which was known for its "rule of law" and centralized administration.

Unlike China, the one thing good about India's bureaucrats is that there is no foreign worship when it comes to foreign nationals. They are equally good at curtailing foreign investment coming into the country.

A project may take years to get approval in India which would have been done in a month in China. In some cases the concerned minister (local or central) has to be approached to get the project approved. It was only recent reforms that some direct windows facilities were created for the foreign investors just to avoid the bureaucratic hackles.

The point we take back home is that it is difficult to overpass an Indian bureaucrat. After all these bureaucrats are selected by a very competitive examination process which has no parallel in the world. In fact some say that it was implemented by the British in India on the pattern of Chinese Imperial Examination to choose the Mandarin scholars known as "keJu zhidu".

India still practices the so-called" rule of avoidance" practiced in the Qing dynasty of China which required that a bureaucrat will not work in a region where their family lived, or where members of their family were in office. Every three odd years they are transferred which was also practiced during the Qing Empire.

Each year India selects its civil servants through a rigorous examination conducted in three stages: mainly the preliminary exam, the main exam and final interview. Each stage is equally important and the whole examination process lasts for more than a year. One is always advised to check his self-confidence before taking this exam as it may land you in a state of frustration if not successful in the four attempts allowed before the age of 30 years.

Out of hundreds and thousands of candidates each year, only between 200 to 300 candidates are finally selected to be sent for two year training in a hill station located in north India. This is the reason that Indian bureaucracy is still not as huge as China. The country has one of the lowest numbers of per capita officers and it believes in the concept of small government.

The minimum qualification for the exam is to be an undergraduate. But many of the top bureaucrats have higher degrees including doctorates, which they yearn after taking leave from the services. Most of Indian bureaucrats are self-proclaimed intellectuals or even possess a PhD degree or MBA from abroad in what is now becoming a trend in China too. But Chinese bureaucrats are supposed to buy degrees and not supposed to yearn it. If you happen to encounter an Indian bureaucrat you can drag him for a coffee and he will deliver a lecture for hours.

Last year Lant Pritchett, a professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University published a manuscript on the efficiency of Indian bureaucracy and exposed the reality of intellectual bureaucrats in New Delhi. He was there to work for the World Bank and found the pathetic situation of the implementation of government policies planned at the Lutyens Delhi. He rightly decided to put a title to his report as "Is India a Flailing State? Detours on the Four Lane Highway to Modernization." His paper concluded that India has all the best policies and welfare major but it exists only on paper.

However I must remind here that what many believe that 'India has failed itself when it comes to governance and it is the private sector and NGOs who are running the show' are wrong. Some people do exaggerate the situation because of their frustration from the system. It is true that some middle class people may get stuck in the system and may not get the work done in time. But things are improving fast and people are becoming conscious of their rights.

There have been some honest officers who can run the one man show and things get moving. As the recent example of the Commonwealth Games in India displayed that despite various concerns the country did display an impressive show to the world.

Another successful example was the construction of Delhi Metro under the leadership of Mr. E. Sreedharan. who was figured in the TIME magazine for his excellence management of the Metro Project. New Delhi today boasts a world class new international airport and also a beautiful well connected Metro rail transport.

Despite all the pros and cons of Indian bureaucracy today each young Indian keeps it as his first choice when he decides his career plan. Some even decline Harvard and MIT offers just to serve the nation. Each year, the topper of the Indian civil services examination becomes a national hero and inspiration for others. Then he gets married with the daughter of a politician and thus the nexus is complete.

The writer is a PhD scholar at Peking University and teaches at Beijing foreign Studies University. He can be contacted at binod@126.com

Courtesy: https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2010-11/08/content_11515582.htm

An Indian Entrepreneur Talks Growth, Regulation and Corruption: BY MUDIT JAIN & ATUL SINGH

 A seasoned industry leader explains how India was and remains a hostile environment for manufacturing. Due to onerous regulations, entrenched corruption, feudal bureaucrats and venal politicians, India has failed to industrialize in contrast to China.

udit Jain is a third-generation entrepreneur and a manufacturer of industrial chemicals in India. He discusses the causes of India’s unnecessarily sluggish manufacturing growth with Fair Observer’s Editor-in-Chief, Atul Singh.

The British ran India with a colonial bureaucracy designed to extract wealth, not to create it. When India won its independence in 1947, many Indians expected the dividend of independence to come in quickly. In some ways, it did — during the 1950s and 1960s, India expanded into nearly all manufacturing sectors, save for high tech and aviation. But the expansion did not survive the 1970s.

While India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru espoused many socialist policies, inspired by the then-successful Soviet Union, he was still relatively favorable to business. When his daughter Indira Gandhi assumed power, she lurched left and decimated business. During her reign in the 1970s, India became a socialist state ruled by officers of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and their underlings. These sycophantic officials imposed onerous regulation, high taxes and extortionate bribes, suffocating industry and squeezing growth.

Socialism killed Indian business

Under Gandhi, India nationalized key industries and heavily regulated the others. The IAS became solely in-charge of formulating and executing policy. Note that the IAS is the successor to the British Raj’s colonial Indian Civil Service (ICS). The original mission of the ICS was to collect taxes and deindustrialize India. After independence, control over the economy gave politicians opportunities for graft and rent-seeking. Together with their bureaucrat lackeys, they created a system that was altogether hostile to business.

The infamous license-permit-quota raj decimated business. In this Kafkaesque system, entrepreneurs had to run from pillar to post and grovel before bureaucrats if not bribe them. Approval from dozens of offices was necessary to do anything. After months and, at times, years of running around offices, entrepreneurs received licenses that were narrowly tailored to specific activities with strict limits on productivity. If their production exceeded the limits imposed by their license, bureaucrats levied hefty fines and extracted heavy bribes.

Gandhi was voted out in 1977 but the hodgepodge Janata Party that took charge was socialist as well and business did not get a break. India’s socialist DNA permeates all political parties, including the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Having tasted blood, politicians and IAS officers cannot let go of the commanding heights of the economy.

Politicians have to appeal to a poor and uneducated populace. So, populism akin to the Latin American variety is always a temptation. Until recently, labor unions were affiliated with political parties, making manufacturing tricky. 

Change because of external shock

Despite the economy growing at the proverbial Hindu rate of growth, India did not change course. In the end, an external shock changed the Indian system. In 1991, the Gulf War increased oil prices. By this time, the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse and could not send cheap oil to India to bail its socialist de facto ally out. This led to a severe balance of payments crisis and India had no choice but to turn to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and embrace market reforms.

The IMF forced India to liberalize its economy, lower its tariffs and open its markets. Many expected Indian businesses to fold in the face of foreign competition. Instead, India’s economy grew faster than ever before. It turns out that socialism, not Hinduism, was holding back the economy. Foreign investment and capital goods flowed into India. Manufacturing got a second wind after the first burst after independence. 

The boost of 1991 petered out for manufacturing in 2001 when China entered the World Trade Organization (WTO). India liberalized trade but did not lift restrictions on domestic business. The government also did not invest in infrastructure. This meant that businesses like Jain’s manufacturing operations could not keep up with their Chinese competitors. 

Rare Story of a Global Indian Manufacturing Success

Chinese manufacturers were able to make things with speed and scale. Chinese imports flooded Indian markets. Even as this economic tsunami was hitting the economy, India’s bureaucrats sat on files forever, demanded nonstop bribes and strangled business with red tape. High costs on inputs such as water, power and transportation made it far more expensive to manufacture domestically than import from China. As a result, many industries collapsed entirely. Liberalization internationally and overregulation domestically proved to be an unmitigated disaster for the manufacturing sector.

The toxic politician-bureaucrat nexus

After independence in 1947, India’s economic model was inspired by the Soviet Union. In this communist Mecca, experts did the economic planning and engineers implemented their plans. In India, economic planning and execution are both in the hands of an omniscient and omnipotent bureaucracy with IAS officers as feudal barons and politicians as de facto rulers. The IAS officers are invariably generalists, with little professional knowledge or deep interest in economic policymaking or the sectors they control. Bureaucrats occupy their position not because of expertise but because of loyalty to politicians and are answerable to no one.

Politicians continue to see business not as a driver of the economy but as a cash cow to squeeze for personal fortunes and election funds. In spite of the rhetoric about pro-manufacturing policies and promoting growth, the Indian system is still essentially one in which politicians dole out freebies to get votes and squeeze industry to pay the bill with heavy taxes. Ultimately, the poor are not helped either, because they see these taxes get translated into higher prices. They also miss out on manufacturing jobs and increased productivity because Indian industry is cut off at the knees and cannot compete with its foreign counterparts. Ultimately, neither the poor nor the entrepreneurs are enriched. Only politicians and bureaucrats laugh all the way to the bank. In India, this Batman-Robin duo is not robbing Peter to pay Paul, but instead robbing both Peter and Paul.

Businesses routinely find themselves compelled to make campaign contributions to politicians, lest they punish business owners with bureaucratic harassment. Such is the convoluted and complicated law of the land that it is impossible to follow it even after making superhuman efforts. So, bureaucrats can shut down any business for alleged breach of the law. As innumerable entrepreneurs and manufacturers know only too well, every bureaucrat inspector finds some grounds to find an infraction, leaving them a choice between a bribe and a fine. Inspectors can also arbitrarily shut down factories. 

The Indian system does not allow corruption inadvertently. It is corrupt by design. Today, Indians impose a new colonialism on their fellow Indians. Indian politicians and bureaucrats operate in a system designed for extracting wealth, not creating it.

Here Is Why Indian Manufacturing Is Struggling

Unfortunately, Jain sees no change on the horizon. If things continue as they have, India will fail to achieve a manufacturing boom that emulates the 1991–2001 period.

Jain believes that India must take a page out of Japan’s book and outsource decision-making power to professionals. Boards of experts should craft regulations in consultation with industry in the interests of long-term growth, not short-sighted political gains. It is good governance, not natural resources or comparative advantage, that made Japan an economic superpower. India can be an economic superpower too if it enlists policymakers with expertise who act in the national interest instead of petty self-interest.

Courtesy: https://www.fairobserver.com/podcasts/an-indian-entrepreneur-talks-growth-regulation-and-corruption/#

India’s Bureaucracy Requires Urgent Reforms: Dhiraj Nayyar

 The merging of the Amar Jawan Jyoti at Delhi’s British-built India Gate with the Eternal Flame at the recently constructed National War Memorial a few hundred metres away has generated a loud debate on the legacy of colonial rule.

There is nothing wrong with revisiting legacies; no nation can be forever a prisoner of its history. The one legacy of the British Raj which continues to have a hugely consequential say on India’s present and future is the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), which underwent a change in name (from Indian Civil Service/ICS to IAS) post-Independence but little change in substance.

Now, as the Centre and states do battle over a change in rules for IAS officers—both want a larger share of the country’s elite administrators—it may be worthwhile to revisit the purpose and role of the IAS, 75 years after Independence.

The logic of a generalist, all India service made sense for the British as the main purpose of the colonial government was to control a vast and diverse country through a coherent and efficient (from their point of view) system of administration. Post-Independence, the value of the IAS was reemphasised by none other than India’s first Home Minister, Sardar Patel, who described it as the “steel frame”, which would hold united a partitioned, impoverished, diverse and democratic country while also setting the wheels of development in motion.

It would be reasonably safe to argue that, for both the British and the early governments of Independent India, preservation and control came first, welfare second and economic growth a very distant third. The instinct of preservation (of the status quo) remains embedded in the DNA of the career bureaucracy.

This explains both India’s relative success post-Independence—in terms of continued democracy, territorial integrity, steady economic growth without implosion—as also its failure—to attain spectacular economic growth, to have a world-class manufacturing base, to raise sufficiently its human capital levels. The system of government is simply not designed to disrupt or take risks.

The debate on civil service reform often gets overtaken by lateral entry, a clear point of resistance for the career bureaucracy. But a holistic discussion requires an understanding of what roles an IAS officer performs over her career. Very broadly, and for the sake of simplicity, these can be broken into three, each lasting around a decade.

In one decade, usually, early in their careers, IAS officers do precisely what they are trained for administration. As SDM/DM or ADC/DC of one of India’s 700-plus districts, they are responsible for law and order and for the administration of all the relevant government (Centre and state) social and economic programmes on the ground. In the second decade, officers are posted in state capitals where they do a mix of implementation and policy design.

Unlike at the district level where they are akin to all-rounders, in state capitals, they go to a ministry and are responsible for implementing schemes and designing state-level programmes in one sector. A third decade is spent at the Centre—as Director, Joint Secretary, Additional Secretary and Secretary—in ministries framing policies and working on regulation.

This work is substantially different from administration/implementation. Career progression through these different roles is not linear, so officers go back and forth from district to state, and from state to Centre.

There is no doubting the abilities of IAS officers, all of whom have to sit through very competitive examinations to get in. But it could be the case that some have greater competence in administration while others have greater competence in policy and the third set in regulation. And in today’s highly complex and specialized world, individuals may have a talent for different types of policy: telecom is different from agriculture, which is different from trade.

So, at the very least, it may make sense to divide the IAS into different streams: administration, policy and regulation. India is moving increasingly towards a full-fledged market economy, so jobs at the Centre require policy and regulation experts. Administrators would instinctively look for a larger role for the government, which may be counter-productive.

It may make sense to divide the IAS into different streams: administration, policy and regulation.

 

But the country needs competent administrators who can address the gaps that exist in physical and social infrastructure on the ground. And regulators need to know how to keep an arms-length from line ministries and perform their tasks with some “independence”. The three should not overlap. It isn’t just about skillsets but also a conflict of interest.

Of course, there remains a strong case for an elite cadre of career civil servants. Lateral entrants can complement but not necessarily replace them. The country can actually have many more IAS officers, but they must specialize and train for the appropriate stream from the start of their careers. That would be a welcome merger of the IAS and 21st century India.

Courtesy: https://www.impriindia.com/insights/reforms-in-indian-bureaucracy/