Indian political leaders and bureaucrat

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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->  <b>For Govt, IAS, IPS and a Harvard MBA don’t mix</b>
Shishir GuptaPosted online: Tuesday, October 17, 2006 at 0000 hrs
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 16: In the absence of a clear-cut policy on deputation of civil servants to the private sector, <b>some of the finest bureaucrats either walk away for higher education or quit service</b>. And the Government can do little other than mark them absent “unauthorized.”

So <b>two of four bureaucrats who have done their MBA from Harvard are now working with multi-national companies on “unauthorized absence</b>” from the Indian government and the third has already quit the Indian Foreign Service (IFS). This only leaves <b>Srivatsa Krishna, the topper of 1994 Civil Services Exam and the first serving IAS officer to get the Harvard MBA degree, as the only one who is pursuing a career with the World Bank’s strategies and infrastructure division with “permission” from New Delhi</b>.

According to the Department of Personnel records, Harvard Business graduates Rita Singh, a 1997 batch IAS officer, and Anubhav, a 2000 batch IPS officer, are both said to be on “unauthorised absence’’ from the government. <b>Singh works with Deloitte Consulting in New York and Anubhav with Google. Abhijit Ghosh is said to have resigned from the IFS to pursue a career with McKinsey in Atlanta</b>.

<b>Wharton MBA Deepak Tayal who works with Bank of America </b>has been issued a show-cause. <b>Vivek Kulkarni, 1979 batch IAS, quit the service to start Brickworks India. Amit Jain, a 1991 Sikkim cadre IAS officer, faces the same “unauthorised absence”</b> against his name on the IAS Civil list on the DoPT website. <b>Jain works with International Finance Corporation of the World Bank. </b>

While civil services rule in the United Kingdom allow five-year private deputation for bureaucrats and vice-versa to promote “cross-fertilisation” of ideas, Indian babudom is still locked in the past.

Even if<b> Indian civil servants get selected to top-notch MBA schools on their own initiative, New Delhi is harsh on deputation to private sector and only clears names on case-to-case basis under rule 6.2.2 of the All India Services Rules</b>.

As of now the Secretary, Department of Personnel, clears private-sector deputation in consultation with the State Government if involved. However, with a large number of applications for such deputations landing up with the Centre, there is a proposal for setting up a three-member committee headed by the Cabinet Secretary for final clearance. This proposal is lying with the Prime Minister’s Office and is expected to be cleared soon.

However, some bureaucrats have been lucky in getting permission.<b> Rajkamal, a Chhattisgarh IAS officer, worked with full permission with McKinsey and so did Manmeet Narang, a Madhya Pradesh IPS officer, with Dell. Both these bureaucrats have done MBAs from Indian School of Business.</b>

<b>London Business School MBA Sanjeev Kaushik, a 1992 batch IAS officer, is working with Lehman Brothers with the permission of the Kerala government. Duke MBA K R K Rao is shown on a study leave by the DoPT website and is working with Circuit City this summer</b>.

The private-sector deputation has also led to a tug-of-war between states and the Centre as states argue that being the cadre- controlling authority, they should have the final say. However, the Centre cites All India Services rules to push its case as the last word on the subject.
shishir.gupta@expressindia.com
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