Ministers’ personal staff: Ex-bureaucrats divided over merit of govt order

Arguing that even earlier people were picked or shunted out because of their perceived loyalties, he said: “Now, at least, nobody will leave with a stigma of being somebody’s loyalist as everybody who worked with the previous regime has been asked to leave because of a rule the government has adopted.”

Most bureaucrats agreed that the personal staff of a minister usually operated as “the off-line source of power”. “These officers or professionals were the wheelers-dealers who did the dirty work for the ministers. They also ran their own agenda on the side. May be the new government doesn’t want to work with people with such a history,” said a senior bureaucrat on the condition of anonymity.

Another former cabinet secretary K M Chandrasekhar, however, said it was an “insignificant” development. “Who works with a minister and who doesn’t makes no difference to the fate of the country. It is natural for a government to want to work with people it has a higher level of comfort with. Beyond that this order has no bearing on how the country works,” he said.

Some, however, thought that the new order will hurt the government itself as it disrupts the continuity. Maintaining that there was no legal or ethical violation in a government wanting to work with a clean slate, former chief election commissioner SY Quraishi said: “One way in which this order could hurt is that with the old staff gone, there will be nobody to guide a new minister on past issues or policies. A clean slate in a dark room could be dicey.”

The first CIC and senior bureaucrat Wajahat Habibullah said the NDA order reeked of paranoia which is unbecoming of a government that enjoys unprecedented majority. “Who are you afraid of? What are you afraid of? The order politicises the bureaucracy. It stamps them as friends or foes of the political party at the helm. This is unfortunate.”

B K Chaturvedi, the cabinet secretary appointed by the Manmohan Singh government in 2004, also said the order “set a bad precedent”. “Tomorrow say a TMC or an AIADMK comes to power and says it won’t work with anybody who worked with any other previous government. It will become a vicious cycle,” he said.