New Cadre Policy for Civil Services
The Union Government in the month of August 2017 had proposed a new cadre policy for the allocation of cadres in the Indian Administrative Services (IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS) and Indian Forest Service. This new policy is aimed at enhancing the experience of bureaucrats and most importantly it is a step for national integration.
In a nutshell, the previously existing 26 cadre were divided into 5 zones and the new officers would have to select from the newly proposed zones.
Old Cadre Policy
Until 2008, there was no set system for preference of state cadre by the candidates. Until then, if the candidates not placed in the insider vacancy in their home states, were allotted a different state in the alphabetic order of the roster.
There was a very highly intricate system and ensured that the officers from different states are placed all over the country and a pan India experience is ensured. The roster began with the letters A, H, M, T; If on one year the roster begins with the states with names beginning with letter A then in the next year the roster will begin with the states whose names began with the letter H and so on. This system was being followed since the mid-1980s.
A revised system was followed from 2008 to 2017 whereby there was one cadre for each Indian State except two cadres: Assam-Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram-Union Territories (AGMUT). One-third of the officers who were posted were to be the home state as insiders from the same state. The remaining were to be posted as outsiders to the roaster in states except their own state as per the preference order submitted.
Thus, the candidates were placed as per merit and choice of preference. In such system, only few get their choice of cadre and not all. Further, once a cadre is allotted, the officer will have to spend a major part of his/her service period in the allocated cadre.
This permanency of cadre of civil servant is liable to result in inefficiency and ineffectiveness in the working of civil services which is exactly opposite of the purpose for which cadre based civil services was designed. This permanency created inability to think in all India character and civil servants limits themselves for the welfare of the state concerned.
Also, there are fewer avenues to share best practices along with collusion of professionals with local politicians as their career prospects are in the hand of State Government. All of this has indeed resulted in slow change in India.
This apart, the system of a cadre based civil services organization had limited recruitment of persons to important positions in the government to those within a particular cadre. This has made lateral entries nearly impossible, thus reducing chances for recruitment of talent suitable to the position. This issue was raised and analysed in the 2ndAdministrative Reforms Commission’s Report. As the government grapples with a plethora of issues that weren’t traditionally faced by the state, it needs personnel capable of dealing with such challenges. Specialized knowledge of the sector concerned is an important asset that could help in performance of the task at hand. Such expertise could help in dealing with the various complexities that the task presents. However, such talent is concentrated in the private sector which cannot be accessed by the government unless lateral hiring becomes a common practice that is encouraged. A nation is just as good as the people who run it; and the bureaucracy plays a crucial role in helping run the nation, and it is important that there be flexibility in hiring and attracting the best possible talent to governmental positions so that the cause of growth and development is best served.
New Carders
In the latest proposed cadre policy, the government has proposed to divide the existing 26 state cadres into 5 Zonal cadres. The Department of Personnel and Training (DoTP)/ Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEF&CC)/ Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) shall decide the vacancies and the distribution of vacancies in Unreserved, SC, ST, Insider, Outsider vacancy.
- Zone-I (AGMUT, Jammu, and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Rajasthan, and Haryana)
- Zone-II (Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Odisha)
- Zone-III (Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh)
- Zone-IV (West Bengal, Sikkim, Assam-Meghalaya. Manipur, Tripura,
- Zone-V (Telangana. Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala)
As per the new policy, a candidate is supposed to select one state from each zone and mark them in the preference order. Previously candidates used to select their home state as first cadre and the neighboring states as the next preferences.
New Cadre Policy and Federalism
India is a federal state with the division of power at horizontal and vertical level bureaucrat play a very important role in the working of governments. It is very important to have bureaucrat with diverse experience of working with different types of people and states as one day they might be heading ministries and departments. Thus, the current cadre policy has been proposed to improve the allocation system and distribute officers all across India.
Many serving officers who were not happy with this new policy stated that such a new policy will reduce the happiness and job satisfaction of bureaucrats and have a direct impact on the efficiency and output quality. But the government firmly believes that this decision which will make them more diverse in terms of working experience. This policy will ensure national integration of the bureaucracy as officer will get a chance to work in state which is not their place of domicile. The new policy will uphold the rationale behind the all India services.
