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Articles

Swelling the Ranks of Government Servants

Dt:  28/9/23

Swelling the Ranks of Government Servants

Dr T H Chowdary*

 

Prime Minister, Sri Narendra Modiji has  ceremoniously  handed over  appointment  letters  to 51,000 persons  selected  for service in several departments  / ministries of the Union  government  on 25/9/23. Earlier, the same type of ceremony was followed to hand over 70,000 appointment letters . With these two  instances 121,000  persons are added to the Central Government . At a minimum of Rs. 30,000 per person per month, these 121,000 employees will constitute  a burden of Rs. 435 cr per year.  Already  the pension payments for the   Central  Government servants exceed the  payment   to   employees  who are still in service.

 

2. Government servants  do not create  wealth.  They are consumers of the   wealth created  by citizens whether  engaged in agriculture or industry or services.  Government servants are to regulate  and   facilitate the productive forces  in the nation. It is the common experience of  millions  of  persons every day  that  government servants especially in the lower ranks are   least helpful and mostly  lording over  ordinary citizens when they come to government offices for some service.

 

3. Digitalization / use of computers  is rightly expected to reduce   the requirement   of persons   and also  speed up  service  delivery  .   At considerable  cost most government offices  are using information technology  (I.T)  and therefore   are more  efficient than before .  Banking transactions are an example . These days we find many bank offices   with sparse   physical presence  of persons,  evidence of  the benefits of computerization in the banking sector.

 

4. It is true that there is lot of unemployment including  among  the degreed persons.  This is because of our ever increasing population  and the increasing  educated or rather degreed , certified but not enough qualified persons. There is all-round clamour from  political parties about unemployment and the failure of all  governments  in creating required employment   opportunities.  Swelling government ranks   to absorb  the unemployed  is  not a wise and economical  move.  It is really surprising and regrettable that  so enlightened  a government presided  by  so knowledgeable  person like Sri Narendra Modi  is resorting to  swelling the government  with employees  whose contribution to the creation of  national wealth  is problematic. 

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