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Created on Friday, 03 July 2020 16:20
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(C. Northcote Parkinson - Image Courtesy: openlibrary.org)
“Work expands to fill the time available for its completion”. This Satirical, maxim stands validated 1000% by India’s extended lockdown, lauded globally for its stringency.
Known as Parkinson’s Law (PL), this maxim now needs strong articulation in the light of amazing speed & efficiency with which bureaucracy spun rules & orders to keep itself & others busy.
Lockdown’s diktats have had multiplier effect as they keep citizens busy during the shutdown & even under the phased unlocking. A law-abiding citizen is always on his toes as he/she has to keep abreast of dynamic regulations for remaining compliant.
If PL creator, C. Northcote Parkinson, were alive, he would have certainly polished Parkinson’s. laws. He might have added a few more.
Dr. Parkinson would certainly have been overwhelmed by unprecedented rise in workload for all during the total shutdown of India beginning midnight of 24th March. The diktats issued by bureaucracy covers all activities in all spheres of life.
Take the simple case of charity. Ideally, one should not disclose whether one has helped the needy. A Government department, however, decided to create a data bank on this.
Read more: India’s Lockdown Necessitates More Parkinson’s Laws
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Created on Sunday, 12 January 2020 03:29
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(Image Courtesy: taxindiaonline.com)
India has paid & continues to pay huge price for being a soft State. We are a nation where good ideas take decades to take-off. We take decades to bite the bullet on strategic issues such as buying planes for Indian Air Force (IAF).
Delays in realm of policies & projects are legendary. Delays have become synonymous with Democracy in India. Delayed Justice is the unwritten rule of the law. Strict enforcement of rules always invites protests from activists & sound-byte hungry media. Many good intentions scripted in directive principles in the Constitution exist as such.
No wonder no one has quantified the fiscal and opportunity costs of delays since the Independence. Even a simple idea as Voter Identity Cards (VICs) has cost the country enormously due to 50-years span between enactment of amendment to a law in 1958 & its comprehensive execution (70% coverage) by 2007 across the country.
The cost of delay got compounded due to corrupt practices in issue of VICs. Illegal immigrants bought VICs with ease – a fact admitted time & again by Government in Parliament.
The right to vote is the last right conferred on aliens-turned citizens in certain democracies. In India, it is the first right sold for a song! Ditto was the case with generous recommendation from MLAs or MPs to issue ration card to illegal migrants in West Bengal – an issue raised by Mamata Banerjee and other MPs in Parliament during the eighties.
Read more: India Bears Colossal Fiscal Cost of Being a Soft State
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Created on Sunday, 02 December 2018 08:58
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(Image courtesy: taxindiaonline.com)
“Reduce politics to end policy paralysis: Narendra Modi.” This headline dated 8th April 2013 is the best Governance-cum-Vikas mantra mooted by Mr. Modi. At that time, he was widely perceived as most convincing Prime Ministerial prospect who focused more on development and less on politics.
Unfortunately, Mr. Modi, as PM, has not followed this mantra, thereby leaving his glass overflowing with policy paralysis (PP). He has also not treated PP with his fabled love for speed in decision-making process. He has instead played more politics than any of his predecessors, thereby catalyzing PP.
PP is a deadly cocktail. It includes backlog of legislative and executive proposals that he inherited from UPA and earlier regimes. The cocktail also includes initiatives that Mr. Modi proposed as Chief Minister but shunned them as PM.
PP, in this column, does not include bucketful of promises that he made at the political rallies. The potion, however, includes initiatives listed by BJP in its 2014 and earlier manifestos for Lok Sabha polls.
Before citing specific instances of PP, we need to recall what Mr. Modi stated at the first ‘Think India Dialogue’ organized by Network 18 in April 2013.
He observed: “All decisions are taken keeping an eye on the next election. Political parties are under pressure to avoid or delay decisions dues to elections”.
Read more: Mr. Modi Creates Policy Paralysis that he once Detested
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Created on Thursday, 30 August 2018 02:52
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UPA’s Tainted GDP vs NDA’s Clean GDP
(Image Courtesy: taxindiaonline.com)
Gross domestic product (GDP) is no longer expressed in black and white. GDP is now painted in different shades. It can be tainted too in Indian political narrative. And this was amply demonstrated last week by Modi Government.
It fired all cylinders to ridicule a news agency story dug from an official report that was lying unnoticed in public domain since 25th July 2018. The story quoted data from the report of Committee on Real Sector Statistics (CRSS) to show that GDP grew faster under UPA than under NDA.
The story also referred to UPA recording double digit growth in two years. This emerged after CRSS linked old GDP data series with new data series.
CRSS was one of the five committees constituted by National Statistical Commission (NSC) for statistical improvements. The fifth panel is yet to submit its report.
Apart from phoo-phooing the story, the Government also downgraded the official report from final one to the draft one. It did the same for three other NSC reports too. As an after-thought, the Government inserted an identical page in all reports, seeking public comments on the reports.
All the four reports were shifted from prominent display on home page of website of Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (mospi.gov.in) to a spot that most visitors would miss (http://www.mospi.gov.in/nsc_draft_reports). This is ultimate proof of Government’s half-hearted commitment towards transparency.
Read more: With GDP Politics Turning Murkier; Save Statistics from Politicians
