Frantically looking for improving administrative functionality and taking a constructive step towards the elusive goal of good administration, the State Legislature enacted the much hyped Public Services Guarantee Act on April 13, 2011. Its implementation formally started from August 23, 2011 when General Administration Department issued first Circular whereby instructions were issued to all the Administrative Secretaries, Divisional Commissioners, all Heads of Departments, all Deputy Commissioners and other concerned officers for strict compliance. The essential purpose of this enactment was to guarantee delivery of services to the public in a specified time-frame failing which action could be initiated against the defaulting officers/officials.
All concerned agencies like State and District level Nodal Officers evinced interest in the Act and the number of services to be provided rose from 13 to 80. The General Administrative Department that worked as the hub for implementation of the Act also designated the structured manpower down to the district level. There would be the accredited agencies to monitor the progress of implementation of the Act for the convenience of general public.
Raising of proper structure and issuance of work methodology to the officer to whom the task was assigned was the essential pre-requisite of the implementation part of the Act. This was done and almost in good time. But once the stage of delivery arrived, inertia, vested interest, irresponsibility and absence of accountability element surfaced. Now the bureaucracy began to fell the heat of the Act. When ordinary people swarmed to the Nodal Office at district level and demanded explanation for delay, deferment or rejection of their cases, it dawned upon the bureaucracy that accountability machine had moved. Since the Act unambiguously stated punitive action for the defaulters in case they failed to provide the justification for administrative measure, the entire structure slowed down the process and gradually let the files collect dust. In consigning the files to the neglected vaults, bureaucracy found an escape route and let the people suffer as usual.
What is more? The General Administration Department, which is supposed to perform the twin key role of ensuring implementation of law and its periodic review by the Chief Minister. Strange to say the Department has failed in both of these assignments. It matters little that the GAD issued several notices and when the time for accountability comes, it will try to hide behind the notices. Do the authority and the responsibility of the GAD come to an end with the issuance of notice? Certainly not. It is there just as a post office? No, GAD is the key administrative organ and it has powers, authority, responsibility and accountability. In this case, it has miserably failed to exercise any of these. If the Nodal Officers had failed to provide the required information or failed to take necessary action, GAD should have taken them to task. It did not and thus let the onus come to its door steps.
An important lesson that the Government needs to learn from this abuse of the Act is that mere passing of the Act does not help. Even the legislature has not cared to ask the Government the status of implementation of the Act. The lesson is that in the first place, the Government has to do some hard homework in assessing the usefulness of enacting a law. While doing so, it has, most importantly, to take into consideration the operative part of the Act. It is obvious and needs no elucidation that by passing this Act, the Government and the legislature were indirectly challenging the insulated authority of bureaucracy. Naturally, bureaucracy would close its ranks to ensure that its monopoly over administrative powers did nor erode. It is the fear of erosion of authority that has compelled the entire structure to soft paddle with the Act.
The remedy lies in giving teeth to the Act. Government has to make a resolve of calling the defaulting officers to book. The general public is disillusioned with the Act and it is the responsibility of the Government to restore the trust of the public. The general impression among the people is that the Act has become mockery and the Government only made tall claims of bringing facilities to the people by enacting this Act. How soon and in what way the Government will remove that impression is what we would like the Government to clarify.
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