Maha Bharat: Episode 7

What does an IAS Officer actually do?

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The bureaucracy in India has been described as the steel frame of the nation. In this episode, we’re going to be talking about a key part of this steel frame: IAS officers. 

Even today, in order to become an IAS officer in India, one has to clear one of the toughest examinations in the country. But the challenge doesn’t stop there. Sandwiched between the politicians and the people, an IAS officer’s job involves a tightrope balance and a really wide range of responsibilities. We tell you a little about what an IAS officer actually does.

Show Notes

All clips and voices used in this podcast are owned by the original creators

We thank wholeheartedly our guest who appeared on this episode:

  • Renuka Vishwanathan

Links to clips used in this episode —

Full Transcript of Episode 7

IAS Officers. 

Think about it, what is the first thing you think of when you hear about IAS officers? Maybe the fact that they have to clear some really difficult exams to become IAS officers in the first place?

Every year, almost every news channel and newspaper interviews the toppers of the UPSC or the civil services exam in India. The top rank holders of this exam generally choose to become IAS officers.

[We hear news reports about IAS toppers.]

The civil services exam is considered one of the toughest exams in India. Forget being a topper, just clearing the exam is considered a huge achievement.

The other occasion when we hear about IAS officers in the news is often when an IAS officer has been suspended, raided, transferred or has resigned.

0:09: UP mein, aavaid khanak ke maamle mein CBI ne aaj IAS adhikaari B Chandrakala se jude ek darjan thikaanon par chaapemaari ki hai.

0:33:And joining me now is our newsmaker of the day, Kannan Gopinathan is the young IAS officer who has quit services over what he believes is the government’s misstep in Kashmir. FADE OUT. 

[We hear news reports about IAS officers.]

But what does the job actually involve? Do we know?

What happens after a person clears the UPSC exam? What is their day-to-day work like? And why do IAS officers get transferred so many times? 

Let’s find out.

Let’s begin with who an IAS officer is. And to understand that, we have to start with the civil service in India.

India’s government has three arms – 

There is the legislature i.e. the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha which is in-charge of making the laws, then there is the executive yaani the President, Vice-President, Prime Minister and the Cabinet of Ministers who are responsible for implementing the laws and then there is the Judiciary i.e. the courts which provide a remedy if a law is broken by someone.

I’m defining this broadly by the way.

Now, the civil service is a part of this executive branch of the government. That is, along with the Prime Minister and the cabinet of ministers, the civil service is in-charge of implementing the laws and policies made by the legislature. 

And this makes sense right? The Government handles so many different sectors — like providing healthcare, building infrastructure, taking care of the finances of the country, ensuring growth in agriculture, industries etc. 

So, how else will the Prime Minister, and other ministers of the cabinet ensure that policies and laws are implemented across all these sectors and for a country that is as big as ours? 

What the government needs is a big workforce (कर्मचारियों) and that’s where the civil service comes in and it is made up of a large number of officers.

Since the executive has to handle such a large number of departments, even the civil service is divided into 23 further categories. Each division is focused on a specific sector. So, there’s a division for forests, the postal department, revenue, foreign service etc.

Now, out of these 23 divisions, the divisions that are most popular in people’s minds are the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS), Indian Revenue Service (IRS) and Indian Foreign Service (IFS). 

And out of all these, the IAS is often (aksar) considered among the most prestigious. The first few rank holders of the UPSC exam seem to prefer to join the IAS. Why is that? One view is that it is considered closest to the decision making process in the government. 

Baat yeh hai ki, within the IAS too, there are different levels (sthar). 

It’s basically like any government department and most of you will know that government departments tend to be hierarchical. So, at each level of that hierarchy, the duties of IAS officers are different.

The IAS officers who are at entry level positions have basic duties like supervising the maintenance of law and order in a district and collecting revenue for the government.

Then there are the middle-level IAS officers who are in charge of coordination between government departments, overseeing the work of  a department, government body etc.

And then there are IAS officers who are at the top-level and are in-charge of very advanced duties like framing policies and advising the ministers on various issues.

We won’t be able to cover all the duties of an IAS officer in one episode. 

So, instead, what I thought we can do is look at the career of one IAS officer in India and look at all the roles he took on in his career. 

That should give us an idea of the range of duties an IAS officer in India performs. 

For this, the IAS officer I have picked is India’s top most IAS officer currently: Rajiv Gauba.

[We hear news clips introducing Rajiv Gauba.]

IAS officer Rajiv Gauba was appointed as the Cabinet secretary in 2019. Cabinet Secretary is the highest position that an IAS officer can occupy within the IAS. But let’s begin at the start of Gauba’s career and look at the different roles he performed.

Rajiv Gauba cleared the UPSC exam in 1982 and became an IAS officer. His first few postings were entry-level roles. He began as a sub-divisional officer in Jamtara and then as a district development commissioner in Dumka  — both in Jharkhand.

Let’s pick one of these roles. What does a sub-divisional magistrate generally do? 

In India, every district is divided into subdivisions. Each subdivision is headed by a Sub-Divisional Magistrate or SDM. Some of the general responsibilities of an SDM are maintenance of land records, protecting public land, election work, issue of certificates such as SC/ST, OBC etc.

SDMs also act as eyes and ears of the Government and conduct enquiries into all major accidents including major fires incidents, riots and natural calamities. They can also take action if people have been imprisoned or kept illegally or if government property has been encroached.

[We hear news reports about SDMs.]

Let’s return to Rajiv Gauba’s career.

In 1988, for a brief period of time, Rajiv Gauba was appointed as the CEO of the Khadi and Village Industries Board in Jharkhand. Here, as CEO, his role would have been to promote the growth of Khadi and village industries in the state. 

IAS officers are sometimes appointed in these roles too where they oversee the development of a particular government sector or industry or body.

After this, in the next few years, Gauba worked as the collector and district magistrate of Nalanda, Muzaffarpur and Gaya. Collector and district magistrate — now these are positions you definitely would have heard of.

What work does a district magistrate and a collector do? These are officers who are above the SDMs and district commissioners: So their duties range from supervising law and order in the entire district to disaster and crisis management. Like right now during the novel Coronavirus pandemic, it is the district magistrate’s responsibility to monitor the spread of the virus in the district.

They also oversee the collection of revenues and implementation of government schemes.

Here’s an example.

[We hear a news report from Aaj Tak.]

News Anchor
Buland Shahr ke DM Saheba ke haunsle buland hai. Ji haan, madam ne un officeron ka jamkar khabar lee hai jo sadak banana ke kaam mein chaani kaat rahe the.

Back to Gauba. Between 1996 and 1997, Rajiv Gauba was appointed in a role in the Central government as the private secretary in the Ministry of Environment and Forests. IAS officers are appointed across state governments as well as Central governments.

What does a private secretary to a minister do? This is not the same as a personal assistant by the way. He or she is generally in-charge of assisting the minister and ensures that the minister’s orders or policies are implemented.

For example, recently, during the Covid-19 Crisis in Kerala, R Mohan, the private secretary to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan is said to be among the people briefing the minister daily on the complaints from the public, the directives from the centre etc. This briefing helps the minister to then take policy decisions.

Right moving on, after a post in the Central government, Gauba ji was posted in an international role in Washington DC as the advisor to the executive director of India at the International Monetary Fund. 

IAS officers are also asked to perform duties in these independent bodies – sometimes abroad as well — but even there, they represent the Indian government and deal with policy and laws.

After the IMF, between 2005 and 2015, Gauba ji took on the roles of additional secretary and joint secretary in a variety of departments: first in the Jharkhand government and then in the Central ministries of forests, information and home. 

Broadly, Joint Secretary and Additional Secretary are those officers who are in charge of overseeing a department’s functioning. They are the connection between the minister and the specific ministry’s employees. 

They can also be the representative of the government in front of the people. For example, the man who is giving us all the Covid-19 updates from the government’s side is a man called Shri Lav Agarwal, who is the health ministry’s joint secretary. 

[We hear a news report about the COVID cases in India.]

I know you’re thinking that every IAS officer seems to be overseeing something or the other. But you must understand that the logic works like this: since this is a hierarchical system, the higher the officer, the bigger the scope of work that he or she is handling. So if an SDM’s scope of work is limited to a sub-division, a DM’s scope expands to include an entire district. Similarly, a joint secretary or secretary’s work expands to a whole ministry which in turn decides policies for the whole country!

Anyway, after joint secretary and additional secretary, Gauba slowly rose further in the ranks to become Secretary in the Ministry of Home affairs which is again a role that oversees the work of the home ministry and is also involved in framing policies.

And after that, Gauba’s most recent promotion came in 2019. He became Cabinet Secretary, the top-most IAS officer in India. 

Now, what does the Cabinet Secretary do? This is a diplomatic role, where he reports to the Prime Minister and has to ensure coordination and consensus between different ministries, he is also in-charge of ensuring coordination between the cabinet and the civil services.

The Cabinet Secretary is also responsible for the management of major crisis situations in the country. A recent example is when Gauba held a video conference with representatives of different state governments about running special trains for the transportation of stranded migrant workers across the country during the Coronavirus lockdown.

Sometimes the Prime Minister gives the Cabinet Secretary specific tasks like B.G. Deshmukh, a former Cabinet Secretary, was asked in 1988, to take urgent action during the political unrest in Maldives where there was an attempt to overthrow the govt. 

The Cabinet Secretary can also on his own initiative take certain matters he thinks necessary and urgent, like supervising steps to be taken to increase exports for example. (But he has to do so in a manner that does not encroach upon the powers/turfs of specific ministries). Since Independence, India has had 31 Cabinet Secretaries, all of them men. We are yet to see a woman IAS officer become a Cabinet Secretary. 

So, looking at Gauba’s career I think should give you an idea that the roles of an IAS officer are multi-level and layered: from sub-district levels to the national level and international level too. The point is simple, wherever the government is involved, the IAS is involved. 

Another thing that is clear, after listening to Gauba’s career story is that an IAS officer has to always work closely with ministers, MLAs, MPs — basically people from political parties.

But one of the interesting things about the IAS and the civil service is that while the party in power changes from time to time, the IAS workforce, at least conceptually, remains the same or is supposed to remain the same. In other words, an IAS officer’s boss can change frequently but his or her job should ideally continue without interruption. 

Sardar Vallabhai Patel called the civil service the steel frame of India — strong and unshakeable. The makers of our Constitution felt that the civil service should function independently as much as possible, outside of the ups and downs of the power games played by political parties. Taaki country mein stability rahe.

Patel in fact said this in the Constituent Assembly:

If you want an efficient all-India service, I advise you to allow the services to open their mouth freely. 

He said that if India wants a good civil service, we have to give them the freedom to do their work and express their opinion.

The makers of the Constitution even put down a very tough procedure to fire IAS officers to protect the independence of IAS officers. 

The rules are that IAS officers cannot be removed from their positions by someone who is junior to them. And the other important rule is that if an IAS officer has to be dismissed, first there has to be an inquiry, and only if a wrongdoing has been proved, then he or she can be fired.

Interesting, no?

But how does all of this work practically? Remember the news reports we heard in the beginning of the episode? Don’t we keep hearing about transfers of IAS officers all the time? 

The most popular example in the case of transfers is the case of Ashok Khemka who has been transferred 53 times in 28 years. The story goes that Khemka has been transferred so many times because he has exposed cases of corruption in the different districts and departments he has worked in. 

[We hear news reports about Ashok Khemka.]

So, what tends to happen in reality is that if a politician does not like a particular IAS officer, he or she tries to get rid of the officer. But since firing IAS officers is so difficult thanks to the Constitutional guidelines, politicians resort to the next best solution: Transfer the officer to another department or state.

Generally this happens a lot when a political party wins an election and wants officers it likes in key governmental positions instead of the ones in the previous government.

For example, when the new Congress government took charge in Rajasthan in December 2018, on its second day, it transferred 40 IAS officers. Similarly, in March 2018 in Uttar Pradesh, the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP government transferred 37 IAS officers.

Ek aur complaint that we often hear is about IAS officers quitting saying they are not able to work freely or because they disagree with decisions that the government has taken.

News Anchor
SS Senthil, a 2009 batch IAS officer has quit the administrative services. He was the DC of Dakshin Kannada and he says in his resignation letter that the decision is purely a personal one. He said and I quote it is unethical for me to continue as a civil servant in the government when the fundamental building blocks of a diverse democracy were being compromised.

Last year, IAS officer SS Senthil सेंथिल quit the IAS because he felt that democracy ke mool adhaar were being threatened. He didn’t give much explanation but it becomes clear that he was disagreeing with the government’s way of functioning. Aise hi, before him, another IAS officer Kannan Gopinathan too decided to quit his job because he disagreed with the Indian government.

I spoke to ex-IAS officer Renuka Viswanathan to understand these problems that IAS officers face. I asked her, as an IAS officer, how independent can you be?

Renuka Vishwanathan
You are expected to speak freely and I have worked with a large number of ministers who used to tell me frankly ya tell us what you think and we do. And Very often we are expected particularly in policy making to give our views on the basis of all the data that we have collected as objectively and as honestly as possible without any personal agenda, we collect it, we examine it and give our views. 

Renuka ji says that when she was in service, she was encouraged by her seniors to speak freely and give her views based on the ground reality, based on the data she has collected. That is her job — now when she submits that view or opinion to the minister or the senior, that person should be open to hearing her out. Then it is their right to make a decision because they have that power given to them by law.

Renuka Vishwanathan
When that view is taken at the authority level which is authorised to take it, which is legally and constitutionally authorised to take it, then there is no problem at all about following it, except except when it actually violates the constitution, violates a law. If that happens, then it is between you and your conscience, you can leave. That’s exactly what Kannan Gopinathan and others have done.

Now, if the decision that your seniors take is constitutionally okay, then Renukaji says that it is the IAS officers duty to follow it. But if it is constitutionally wrong, then IAS officers should decide what they want to do — continue or quit. Officers like Kannan Gopinathan and Senthil decided that they wanted to quit.

Renuka ji also summarises this nicely. She calls it the Faustian Bargain. – a Deal with a Devil. Shaitaan ke saath samjhauta

Renuka Vishwanathan
In every bureaucrat’s life there is one moment or at least several moments when you are asked to sell your soul for something. The pressure can be mild, the pressure can be strong, you know what is at stake. You know if I do this tomorrow, I won’t be able to call my soul my own because I have not done the right thing. 

And there will always be a carrot offered to you, there will always be a punishment if you don’t do. And every bureaucrat faces that moment of crisis. And how people react that shows their moral fibre.

Yaani, har IAS officer ke career mein, there are many such moments when they are asked to sell their soul. Uske badle mein sometimes, there is a reward, sometimes there is a punishment. Toh IAS officers kya choose karenge, that decides their                                                                                        

There is another side to this debate as well. It’s not like all IAS officers are perfect and always follow the law. For instance, there have been many cases of corrupt IAS officers.

[We hear news reports of IAS officers taking a bribe.]

The point is that IAS officers are also capable of misusing their power in one way or another. So giving complete independence to the IAS cadre is also not an ideal option. There have to be some checks and wrongdoers have to be punished too. 

Think about it, in a democracy, it is the people who have the power and they elect the MLA or the MP to represent their voices. So the MLA or the MP should ideally have the power to dismiss or pull up an officer who breaks the rules. This of course assuming that the MLA, MP or Minister is acting within the rules of the Constitution and not based on his whims and fancies.

Whether it is the politicians or the bureaucrats, both have to act to protect the interests of the people.

It’s a delicate balance that both the IAS and the politicians have to achieve but one that is necessary to achieve for us to function as a healthy democracy.

Well, I’ll stop here. This is broadly the story of the IAS in India — we haven’t covered all aspects of it. But I hope you have some insight into the work that they do and why they often end up in the eye of the storm.

I’ll be back next week.

Credits

Narrated by – Dhruv Rathee
Producer – Gaurav Vaz
Research help –
Written by –

Title Track Design – Abhijith Nath
Audio Production –