Common fallacies while serving the nation

Look around within the working environment and one shall find many who never really started or have given up at the slightest pretext. It is such attitude that is indeed the biggest drag in the forward march of organizations and also the nation.

The staff is bad : How common and how unfortunate is the oft heard rant of the senior blokes that if they had better men with them, they would have delivered. I am good and they are bad, I am honest and the rest are not, I am committed and others are not and more often than not – no one else is bothered about the organization. Sadly these are words uttered by the mediocres who aspire for positions, get them and yet never become worthy of them. Over thirty five years of service has convinced me that the root cause behind non deliverance is inadequate bureaucratic leadership.

There is no support : If I had enough support I would have done it. Unfortunately this penchant of relying heavily on support from the superiors has been carried to a ridiculous extent by almost all and sundry. The guy who seeks support from those above him actually rarely supports those who look upto him. It is almost akin to the hostel experience – I was ragged so I will rag, I was not looked after so why should I and so on and so forth. The go-getters however go ahead and do it nevertheless.

People are corrupt – Very often we paint with one black brush those who we work for and also work with. The widespread extent of corruption is indeed undenied yet the only way one can help clean this rut is neither by complaining nor castigating others but by being a crusader for the cause and at the same time carrying an unwavering focus on the objective to be achieved.

Inadequate funds – The failure to realize that money is the least of the issues unfortunately never dawns on most of us who start their careers with and also end up with almost a regular banter about inadequacy of funds, for want of which they believe they have been failing to deliver. Look around and witness the creation of empires literally from scratch by budding entrepreneurs of the yesteryears and even today. They never cribbed and in the process created wealth. That initiative is the first step to generate wealth rarely gets appreciated.

The boss is bad : This is rarely true and but not as often as it is made out to be. The presence of a few rotten apples cannot be wished away yet the realization that if one is a good boss, he also gets one, rarely gets appreciated.

Life is not fair : Having been treated in an unfair manner remains the biggest grouse of almost all blokes thronging the environment. It however rarely matters to them whether they have been fair or not in their dealing with all those who fall within their sphere of influence. And fairness after all is a matter of perception, often perceived wrongly.  

The eternal pessimist : And one often bumps into many of them. That being fiercely optimist is often the only way to turnaround a really bad situation is often never believed and therefore rarely practiced. Like optimism builds itself many times over and in the process converts an impossible scenario into a possible one, pessimism attracts negativity at a much faster rate and often converts an already won battle into a lost one.

And lastly the misplaced notion that a position is merely for self-perpetuation and not a means to achieve an objective, a noble one at that, is so widespread that it is not at all funny. Almost everyone aspires for top slots, but unfortunately only for the power and pelf that goes with it, and the transient nature of these gains is appreciated only when they end, as all good times do but by then it is too late. Performing what the position expects from the incumbent is the only thing that has the power to give a lasting experience.

Amen!

2 Down – More to go?

The arrest of two senior railway officers recently – Rakesh Kumar CEO of CBFC and K.M.Tripathi former CGM of IRCTC for accepting bribes made headlines. That both these officers are young and from the services is indicative of the depths to which some of us have fallen.

Yet these incidents are not a bigger surprise than the Railgate of 2013 that placed railways as the epitome of corruption in the country. Never before in the history of independent India was a secretary level officer arrested and charged for manipulating with hard cash, his own posting at an apex level in the organization. Yet he was the person who was caught and crucified while others of his elk got away. We all were witness to juicy details of wrongdoings on the part of the powers to be during those days, the shocking cell phone conversations covered by dailies, yet the incident that was expected to mark the beginning of many more heads rolling, actually became the end of such investigations with the result that corruption flourished and achieved new heights.

Recent report of the CVC also placed the railways at the numero uno position in so far as corrupt practices and the number of officials charged with graft are concerned. Not a matter to be proud of, especially for those who like to walk with their heads held high.

It is really a “low” for this great organization. Being regarded as the epitome of corruption is definitely not something one can write home about, yet the very fact that the wheels of this great organization keep rolling magnificently speaks volumes about the cutting edge employees of this organization. 

Is this – the recent arrests – marks the beginning of the end of corruption in this great organization? Many wish so yet the majority having tasted the consequences of not toeing the line would continue to remain skeptical. And that leads me to wonder – why officials from the services despite reaching fairly senior and well-paying positions go astray and secondly why do officers who consider themselves honest miserably fail to stand up to misdeeds of superiors. Prime Ministers clarion call from the red fort this independence day to rise above the "Mera Kya, Mujhe Kya" syndrome needs to be inculcated. Perhaps there is something wrong with our grooming of youngsters who have come to regard their jobs, not as service as Modi exhorted the nation to, but as opportunities at loot and self-aggrandizement. Sad it is, yet one has to accept the ground realities as emerged during Railgate and reinforced by the recent arrests and CVC’s damning revelations.  

That the new government looks upon railways as the prime mover of economic activity in the nation is indeed heartening. The immense potential that railways possess in triggering and giving a push to economic activity in the nation is waiting to be tapped. But for that the organization shall have to first eradicate corruption and unethical conduct cutting across levels, an exercise that would indeed unlock the tremendous potential of this monolith.

There is absolutely no doubt that the time has arrived for this great organization to move in the direction of a genuine fulfillment of national aspirations. In God we trust.......

The conscience keepers whither away!

The conscience keepers either sleep or connive with the devil and the system goes haywire. This unfortunately has been happening with the nation as well as its lifeline during the last couple of years. What transpired recently in the railways was an unassailable symptom of the conscience keepers at the apex levels conniving with the devil, directly or indirectly for personal gains or out of fear.   

The problem is deadly yet has a simple solution. The conscience keepers who are fairly senior in the pecking order have to be fair and firm regardless of the consequences. Is it indeed asking for the moon?

In a Loktantra, the real power vests in the elected representatives yet the job of the conscience keeper is assigned to the permanent group, that of the bureaucrats. These servants of the republic confer a sense of permanency to the government that otherwise puts on a new cloak every five years. And therefore they have a major role to play, that of the guardians of the rules, procedures, processes and the conscience of the collective, yet the role is generally found wanting.

The various scams of the 2G, 3G, CWG, Adarsh, Coalgate and Railgate varieties to name a few would not have happened had the conscience keepers played their roles with impunity. A bureaucrat merely has to place in writing the facts of the case, the correct rule position, the ethical stand and the course of action that he feels is the best fit in the prevalent circumstances and then it is for the competent authority, at times the elected representative to take a call in tune with the noting or otherwise. It is plainly as simple as that, yet almost a rarity!

Why the conscience keepers are generally a dismal failure despite the protection afforded to them by virtue of a permanent job guaranteed by no less than the president of the republic is rather difficult to fathom?

It is fairly obvious that the sarkari tantra over a period of time has emerged as an organ primarily suited for self aggrandizement of its constituents. A budding youngster of today joins the services not inspired by lofty ideals but for the ample opportunities the service provides for accumulating wealth and flaunting power in the public domain. A servant of the public at large desirous of extortion from the system and flaunting power over people he is paid to serve! The entire concept of selfless service has perhaps been thrown out of the window in this wonderful nation of ours.

It is indeed time that the concept of selfless service is reinforced down the throats of all those who are paid to serve yet serve to be paid!

Words of Wisdom

Rajesh Agarwal had the entire audience in a trance for almost two hours. Addressing over two hundred officers and supervisors at the motivational seminar organized by the IRSME association of the northern railway, the most important point that Rajesh emphasized was the need for a good character, the sheer absence of which is plaguing almost the entire sarkari sector cutting across states and services and the railways is no exception.

The uniqueness of such talks lies in their sheer absence as the focus of various service associations remains confined generally to organizing drink and dinner parties for their members. Welfare is never at the core or even in the fringes of the activities of such service associations. Yet my recent stress on giving a new dimension to the activities of the IRSME was overtly welcomed by almost everyone and that is ample evidence of a hidden desire for change and improvement even amongst the officer clan of the railways, of whom I have always been a silent critic all along. 

My biggest find in the over three decades of active service is that people are indeed waiting to be led to a land of milk and honey, even if it necessitates toil and sweat and also a need to be on the right side of perfect value systems. Rajesh also emphasized on the need for organizations and their constituents to lay stress on value systems that are indeed the building blocks of a good society as well as organizations. Yet in my long service, with the exception of perhaps two, I did not come across bosses who even once mentioned the need for organizations to lay stress on character and value systems. Sad the entire scenario is, yet the saving grace is the silent acceptance of the goodness that lies in being good, even by those who have crossed the fine line that defines the threshold of integrity of both the financial and professional kind.

Rajesh helped clear the cobwebs that had perhaps started forming inside my head since the last couple of weeks. He reinforced clarity on various fronts and laid at rest doubts that may have started surfacing about the need to be genuine almost always despite the entire environment being on the contrary. The sheer irrelevance of many issues that earlier kept the mind preoccupied silently dawned on me. 

Omnipresent corruption

Things have now come to such a pass in the country that even the corrupt believes that he is being harrassed and persecuted by corrupt government functionaries. The saddest part is that the honest people who are in power and can really do something have also started accepting corruption as a normal way of life.
The governments of today, the majority of them with rare exceptions of course have started resembling a giant mall where every service is on sale. It is actually impossible for anyone, even the minor government functionaries to be able to get anything done from the sytem without the customary greasing of palms.
The recent incident that brought a lot of shame to the fantastic state of Madhya Pradesh is perhaps a small window in the reality of today. A reality that is ugly, and that is why is kept under wraps. A reality that is responsible for keeping the nation backward and poor. But why such incidents do not result in a widespread anger and anguish against the system is what bothers me truly.
The high level of acceptance of, rather than corruption per se is the real cause of concern!