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| Desperately delayed | | | Dilip Cherian
That National Knowledge Commission (NKC) chairman Sam Pitroda and HRD Minister Arjun Singh are not best friends is well known. Despite that, NKC's suggestion to appoint an independent regulator for higher education may actually see the light of day. According to sources, the government at the highest level is seized with hiving off the accreditation arms of the All-India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) and the University Grants Commission (UGC) and merging them into a professionally-run independent organisation. R.P. Agarwal, secretary, higher education, is currently studying various options to take this forward. Private educational institutions have long demanded a systemic change in the inspection system. Certainly, babu-watchers are hoping that this will end "inspector raj" of the AICTE, which has certainly seen better days. Many of its inspectors have been accused of corrupt practices in granting licences.
It's current head, R.A. Yadav, is under scrutiny for drawing salary as head of AICTE and a pension from Delhi University. He was appointed allegedly at the explicit behest of the now ailing HRD minister Arjun Singh.
It is also unlikely that all this is going to happen anytime soon. Mr Agarwal and his babus have to make changes in the existing laws and get parliamentary approval. Nevertheless, most observers agree it is a radical but necessary step.
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No work, no funds
Funny how what is considered a norm in the world of business for decades becomes a "paradigm shift" in babudom. Currently babus in Ahmedabad are debating a 16-page circular from Tapan Ray, the state's principal secretary, finance. Mr Ray has asked them to provide performance indicators whenever they demand funds for various projects and schemes. Mr Ray, according to babu-watchers, hopes to wean his political masters and fellow babus away from the practice of treating budget exercises as meant only to aggregate numbers. The babus have been given a deadline of May 10, 2010 to achieve this goal. That's also when Gujarat celebrates its golden jubilee.
By then babus will be required to show the expected expenditure against each of their departmental activities for determining costs. This would be quite contrary to the conventional budgeting exercise till now. Of course, implicit in the new directive is the crucial message that funds will no longer be available for activities that do not yield the stated results. Now that would be real bad news for some! And Gujarat's babus now have to cope with this new paradigm shift pretty quickly because time is running out.
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Cat has more lives
Clearly the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) and the various state administrative tribunals must be doing something right for my favourite tribesmen to attempt to reduce their powers. Babus are busy amending the Administrative Tribunals Act. What perturbs them is the power of these tribunals to invoke the Contempt of Court Act for non-compliance of its orders.
Unfortunately for the babus, a parliamentary standing committee headed by E.M.S. Natchiappan, a Rajya Sabha MP, has stopped this attempt. According to sources, Mr Nachiappan and other members of the panel shot down the proposed amendment from the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) that would take away CAT's contempt power, reducing the tribunals to toothless tigers.
Thanks to this botched attempt, CAT has emerged stronger. Apparently, Mr Natchiappan and his fellow MPs on the committee now feel that the nodal agency for dealing with CAT-related matters should be handed over to the ministry of law and justice instead of mere DoPT babus. Whether that will come to pass is a moot point. But Satyananda Mishra, secretary, DoPT, and his cohorts are surely keeping their fingers crossed! |
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