Stop passing the buck when you see files, cabinet secy tells officers

Stop passing the buck when you see files, cabinet secy tells officers

Dipak.Dash@timesgroup.com

New Delhi:25.12.2021

For years, government officials have taken refuge in phrases such as “may also see” or “may kindly see” on files that move from one desk to another just because no one wants to take a call on the matter mentioned in them — a case of passing hot potatoes around in circles.

The “syndrome” has caught the attention and drawn criticism from the country’s top bureaucrat at a time when the government is seeking to speed up decision-making and reduce red tape, with cabinet secretary Rajiv Gauba urging senior officers to consciously avoid taking recourse to such phraseology and encourage other colleagues not to succumb to risk-averse behaviour.

Seeking a change in the way the government works, the cabinet secretary said at a workshop on ‘Increasing Efficiency in Decision Making’ that unless government departments change their culture and take timely decisions, even big-ticket announcements made by the government will not take off.

Decisions can be taken at jr level: Gauba

Several levels don’t make any value addition; they don’t make any significant contribution to decision-making and also these don’t mean qualitatively better scrutiny. What they certainly mean is more time consumed and diffused responsibility so that they can say that so many other people also looked at that issue and so there is abdication of responsibility,” he said, referring to file submissions at multiple levels while speaking at the event which was part of the Good Governance Week.

Gauba’s comments came after coal secretary Anil Kumar Jain flagged how many officers were simply putting their signatures on files without adding any value. Road transport secretary Giridhar Aramane also cited how there was huge delay in issuing toll fee notification for highway stretches as the files had to pass through several layers of officials, which has now been drastically reduced.

The cabinet secretary said that in the government system, there is a culture of marking papers to the higher-ups even when the decisions can be taken at the junior level. “We are familiar with the syndrome of ‘may also see’ or ‘may kindly see’ so that you feel safe that it has been seen by somebody else or somebody above. I think this has to do with risk avoidance. The DoPT and DAPRG (administrative reform and grievances redressal department) should look at the root cause of why this syndrome has developed and what needs to be done,” he said.

The government has pushed the reforms to reduce the levels for file submission up to four against the earlier practice of such submission at 7-8 levels.