Political Interference in Bureaucracy Causes, Consequences

and Remedies

The administrative of any democratic country is

analogous to a ship. The owner of the ship is its
people, the captain is the representatives chosen
by the people elected politicians and the sailors
are the ones who help the captain in taking the
ship to its destination the bureaucrats. It is by the
integrated and coordinated approach of the three
that the ship reaches its destination. Here the
relation between the captain and the sailor is of
primary importance as they are on board and take
the prime responsibliy of the ship.
Political representatives are directly responsible to the
citizens as they are weighed on the parameters of
completion of their election promises. They are
subjected to close scrutiny and hence are hence in
constant pressure of being politically correct and at
the same time have to deliver. In contrast the
bureaucrats are the permanent executives and are
directly responsible to the political heads and
indirectly to the people. They have the technical
know how and are required to translate the policy
formulations into policy implementation. They are
expected to operationalise theplan and show
results at the ground level.
Both the temporary executive and the permantent
executive need to work in tandem for the overall
development of the citizenry and country at large.
As famously quoted A bad administration cannot
implement a good policy, a bad policy can not be
saved by a good administration. Hence each
should offset the shortcomings of the other for
producing positive results.
Intervention Vs Interference

As noted by the Second Administrative Reform Report

optimum space needs to be provided for the
bureaucrats so that innovative solutions can be
achieved. A thin line lies between intervention and
interference. Political intervention in bureaucracy
is essential in a democratic country, not political
interference-PM NarendraModi.
Due to a lack of comprehensive guidelines regarding
the political-administrative relation, this is largely left to
discretion and sometimes misused leading to
detrimental interference amounting to curbing the
bureaucratic freedom of judgement and operation. The
political class with stringent time frame of 5 years may
resort to hassled implementation. The political power
and supremacy may also undermine the possibility of
creative operation space for the permanent executive.
With no detailed guidelines for grounds of transfer of
the public servant, there has been a growing
prominence of a transfer industry sucking the
enthusiasm and motivation off the bureaucrats.This has
inturn led to sycophancy which in turn paves the way
for embezzlement of funds and corruption.
The Supreme Court has paved the way for a civil
services code in its recent judgment .