The Steel Frame, Uninterrupted

                                                    The Steel Frame, Uninterrupted

Political parties rarely band together except on issues that are seemingly in the interest of the vast majority which feels discriminated against by the microscopically small number of the privileged  ‘elites’. These are magic moments -short periods of time which are very special- not because parties come together in opposition to elitism, but because every party hopes to cash in the vote bank of the sizeable majority especially when elections are round the corner. The decibel level inside the Parliament reaches a crescendo when members cutting across all parties express their verbal concerns for the less privileged groups who seek a share in the elitist pie.

The new government started the ball rolling with the scrapping of FYUP in Delhi University favouring the majority without even entertaining the possibility of restructuring the programme that would have made a vast difference to the quality of undergraduate education. FYUP was opposed mainly by teachers on the ground that they were not involved in the structuring of the foundation courses which were puerile and jejune, but the truth is the teachers opposed to it never expressed a desire to restructure the foundation courses; they preferred the easier route of throwing the FYUP lock, stock and barrel.  It is analogous to throwing the baby with the water bath without refilling the tub with fresh water. Students opposed it without any reason except that it prolonged their graduate programmes by an additional year.  They were least bothered about the lack of quality in the existing three year graduate programmes that provided them neither knowledge nor skill nor competency for any job at the end of three years of graduation. The foundation courses introduced in the first year of the FYUP aimed at giving students an inclusive understanding of different disciplines that impact each other and impact life in general, thereby providing the students the intellectual space to explore a wide array of disciplines other than the ones they have opted to major in. The aim was to provide inclusive learning that is different from in-depth learning.

FYUP is now history. The next history maker is CSAT. This time it is orchestrated by a huge majority of civil service aspirants who failed to make the final cut. CSAT has become a merit versus mediocrity debate.  The protesting group of students are mainly from the Hindi heartland and they demand the scrapping of the English tests from the preliminary exam.

The Civil Services Examination (CSE) is a nationwide competitive examination in India for recruitment to the various Civil Services of the Government of India, including Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS), Indian Police Service (IPS), Indian Audit and Accounts Service among others. These premier services constitute the Indian bureaucracy known as the steel frame of the government which  provides the government’s  Cabinet secretary, top administrators ,the Comptroller and Auditor General to name a few. The examination is one of the toughest examinations in the world with success rate of 0.1%-0.3% out of  more than 500,000 applicants. It is conducted in two phases - the Preliminary examination, consisting of two objective-type papers (General Studies and Aptitude Test), and the Main examination, consisting of nine papers of conventional (essay) type followed by the Personality Test (Interview).

On an average 5-6 lakhs apply every year and the number of candidates who appear for the examination is roughly 3 lakhs. Out of this only the top 10-11 thousand will be selected after the CSAT examinations. The mains will further weed out three fourths of these, retaining just about 2000 who will be called for the interview. At the end of the interview, the number selected to the civil services will be  around 1000 depending on the number of vacancies in a given year that includes mandatory  reservation quota. 

This shows that these premier services select those who can cross all the toughest hurdles and the ratio of success to failures in these examinations works out to 1: 300. The protestors are from the Hindi belt asking for scrapping English from the CSAT (from the preliminary examinations). It is an irrational and illogical demand as the level of English/Mathematics  required  for CSAT is that of the  X^th standard. The minimum eligibility criterion for sitting for the civil services exam is a graduate degree-i.e full five years of study after the X^th. The protest has highlighted the poor quality of applicants  from our schools and colleges/universities where they have to study and pass English courses. The question is why have these Hindi heartland graduates not protested against learning English in schools and colleges?  The school leaving board exams both at the Xth and the XII standards have English as one paper. The English marks are taken into account when the students seek admission  to colleges. Once in college they have the three year graduate programmes which also have English as one of the compulsory disciplines.. It does not stand to logic that those who had accepted English for ten years of study(assuming that they started learning English after their Vth standard) protest the inclusion of basic English in the nationwide civil services competitive examination held for selecting only those who are  capable of accepting  challenge and competition at the highest level in their professional service. Can we imagine our cricketers protesting against beamers in a bouncy pitch in England or Australia or South Africa saying it is unfair for those coming from the placid batsmen friendly pitches of the sub continent? If we are incapable of taking up challenges, we have to stay out wherever we are and not venture out. Aren’t these protesters driving a wedge between Hindi and non-Hindi belt?  Aren’t they also displaying a weak-kneed approach to  take up challenges? In fact, success comes to those who challenge their own potential to triumph over difficulties. Earlier when the previous government had abolished X^th Boards, I felt that we were denying our children the opportunity to face challenges, to compete with one’s own ability and to raise the bar.  To compete means to strive to outdo others to attain one’s goal. No competitor can set the rules and regulations as to what and how s/he will be tested. Since the aim is to select the top contenders, such lachrymose and weakling demands by the applicants do not make them eligible even to take the examinations.  These protesters are not even well educated on the status of official languages in India. English is one of the Associate official languages of India and it serves the purpose of a link language for administrative cohesiveness bringing non Hindi speaking states in communication with Hindi speaking states. If the demand from the Hindi belt students is admitted for the sake of votes, it will be prejudicial against all those who have been educated in regional (other than Hindi) and English languages.

The once vaunted steel frame of India- India’s strong and vibrant bureaucracy- has already rusted considerably. The only people who benefit from a rusted bureaucracy are the politicians who can twist and turn the present set of officers- a sizeable number among them have shown themselves to be spineless with an Achilles heel for fattening their purses. The politicians want such pliable and bendable bureaucrats to serve their goals. At a time when there is a need for an efficient, intelligent, clean and honest bureaucracy, it will be a retrograde step to allow civil service aspirants to dictate what they would like to answer and not what they should answer. It is also disturbing that those who are agitation for reforms resort to violence and destruction of public vehicles and offices. If they succeed in their aggressive agitation, how will they succeed in bringing order in the future when they assume office as administrators? 

Political parties seize this opportunity with glee to enhance their vote bank. They give lip service to the  demand for strong and dynamic civil services to administer the country. The agitation is simply a contention between merit and mediocrity. If the political parties selfishly rally around the latter it signals the shape of chaos for the future. The agitators’ demand for reforms is to destroy the current level playing field that asks for just  X^th level competence in English and Mathematics (for every aspirant would have done the Xth English and Maths). If the translation from English to Hindi in the CSAT questions poses a problem, that can be looked into and remedial measures can be put in place.

Let CSAT not go the way as FYUP. CSAT is the first step towards building the steel frame for the future. The old steel frame is dying-if not dead. The new frame is yet to find the columns, the beams and the girds to support it-the vertical columns that stand for ramrod straight honesty and integrity, the horizontal beams that cover wide perspectives and the rectangular grids that provide the strength and support for the entire frame. Gramsci remarked in his Prison Notebooks : “The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new yet to be born. In this interregnum, a great variety of morbid symptoms appear”. It is of the gravest importance that we recognize the morbid symptoms of frustrated, indolent and violent minds that would further weaken the steel frame. Our Parliamentarians should not be myopic to look at the immediate prospects of being in power; they should as Marcel Proust said:” “…never be afraid to go too far, for truth lies beyond”. The truth is a strong India built on a strong and straight Steel Frame that had been the pride and glory of Indian administration in the past.