Social Mobilization for Public Accountability

This chapter examines administrative accountability through the democratic pillar of public transparency. One of the pillars of democratic accountability is the availability of adequate information in the public domain about the functioning government. It has taken a social movement for transparency in government to establish people’s right to information through the passage of the Right to Information Act in 2005. However, traditional administration has not reconciled to its demands and PPPs are kept out of its purview on the plea that they are not public authorities. The Lok Pal (ombudsman) Bill has been passed in response to another struggle of civil society.

Public–Private Partnership (PPP)

Among the more prominent initiative taken in governance reforms is that of forging public-private partnership both at policy as well as at administrative level. This chapter critically examines its rationale for delivering public goods and services. While accepting its promotion in physical infrastructure sector, where high levels of capital and technology are demanded, the author questions its relevance in the social sector, where distributive policies are an important part of implementation agenda. However, these partnerships are a continuation of the perspective of de-politicization, technical proficiency for increasing performance efficiency.

Reform or Silent Revolution

The concluding chapter summarizes the analysis and argues that a silent revolution is taking place transforming the whole idea of public administration focusing on public interest in providing public goods and services. The reform movement during the Plan period aimed towards strengthening this perspective. The neoliberal era is dominated by concerns of efficiency and technical competence in delivering services. The vocabulary features privatization, public–private partnerships, semi-autonomous institutions, and so on. New institutions in this framework are being established while traditional ones continue to exist. To oversee that these institutions work in public interest, multiple regulatory agencies are being instituted. A complex system of administrative system is emerging where boundaries of public and private are getting blurred and accountability being eroded.

Nature of Indian Administration

This chapter emphasizes the position of district collector and the role of civil service as a significant legacy of colonial administration. The developmentist administration added more functions and responsibilities to them; thus, embellishing their power and importance in the system. This rising power was challenged by other functional services with demands of service parity and appointments to positions of their specialization. Rivalry and conflicts arose but no change took place in spite of indictments from many reform committees.

Introduction

This chapter briefly introduces the broad theme of the book. Very early, with adoption of the democracy and development as key foundational goals, it was understood that the inherited colonial administration with its strong civil service system was not appropriate for the new dispensation. Committees and commissions were appointed and international experts invited to suggest ways of reform. Little substantive impact was made till neoliberal economic policies were adopted in 1991. This period transformed that focus and support of the private sector was sought in implementing state policies. The chapters that follow discuss many issues emerging from this broad theme.

Emerging Institutions and the Challenge of Democratic Accountability

This chapter reflects on parliamentary accountability of new governance institutions. Parliament has a constitutional agent in the office of the comptroller and auditor general (CAG) to report on the performance of government expenditure. On the one hand, it is contended that since institutions with PPPs include private investment, the CAG does not have a role in auditing them. On the other hand, the view is that these institutions are public authorities and come under the purview of the CAG. The debate is far from settled and public audit is still denied to these institutions. In this chapter, some instances where the CAG has undertaken audit on its own are presented.

Partnership in Policy Process

This chapter narrates the relationship of government with businesses during the Plan era when policies were determined by government for businesses to follow, mainly regulating economic production. However, often businesses tweaked regulations when they affected their work negatively. In the neoliberal era, government–business consultations were institutionalized and formal participative committees to initiate specific polices were also instituted. Issues of the influence of business on public policies and its social consequences are also raised in this chapter.

The Formal Reform Effort

The chapter points out that concern for inappropriateness of a colonial-style administration and need for reform had been a continuous refrain since Independence. A number of formal committees and commissions had been appointed and their recommendations discussed. A widely noticed report was that of an international expert Paul Appleby in 1953, which set the pace for this activity. Five-Year Plans and pay commissions joined in by adding suggestions. However, little impact was made and the administration continued with an essentially colonial legacy.

Struggle for Political Control

The political leadership used the civil service’s predominant role in administration as an instrument to further its own goals. This chapter provides an account of how while Indira Gandhi initiated a debate on its neutrality and commitment, the political leadership struggled to establish the subservience of the civil service. No formal change took place but informally loyalty and reliability became attributes to place bureaucrats to positions that were considered critical, giving rise to a legitimately approved transfer system. This has helped the prime ministers to take a stance critical of the civil service while freely relying on it to implement their policies.

Provisioning of Education and Health in Public–Private Partnership (PPP) Mode

This chapter illustrates the consequences of privatization and public–private partnerships in delivering education and health services in India. The reasons for using PPPs in providing physical infrastructure are very different from the ones for their use in the social sector. In both kinds of services, no single mode of PPP is implemented and experimentation has been widely undertaken. PPPs pose challenges of inclusion and affordability in the health and education sectors. Significantly, the chapter also underlines that the private sector hesitates to enter partnerships where profitability is low. It concludes that the regulatory mechanisms are ineffective as conceived at present.