A minor revolt that has been brewing within the IAS fraternity in the last couple of years has burst into the open.
One of Kerala's top bureaucrats, revenue principal secretary Dr V Venu, is said to have told his minister (E Chandrasekharan) to look for another secretary to helm the Revenue Department if young IAS officer V R Premkumar was not reinstated as the survey director.
Premkumar, who was appointed as survey director last August, was removed from the post on March 4.
Simultaneously, Dr Venu shot off a missive to his boss, chief secretary Tom Jose, asking him to reconsider the decision to unseat Premkumar as survey director. This is perhaps the first time a top bureaucrat has put on record his objections to what has been generally termed an “arbitrary” transfer of a competent junior officer.
Dr Venu's show of rebellion seems to have so rattled the government that the revenue minister is said to have assured him that Premkumar would continue as survey director.
Any sense of professional unease in Dr Venu will be taken seriously as he is not just a senior bureaucrat but is also the man Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan had handpicked to head his prestigious Rebuild Kerala Initiative.
IAS circles say that Premkumar's removal was just the last straw. “In the last few years, junior officers were tossed about from one insignificant posting to other as if they were junk. The younger lot are highly demoralised,” a middle-level IAS officer who is now a secretary told Onmanorama on the condition of anonymity.
Dr Venu conveyed a similar message to the chief secretary. “The abrupt transfer of a young IAS officer will not only demotivate him, but also send a negative signal to the IAS officers serving in sensitive and responsible positions,” his letter said.
Junior officers Onmanorama talked to have been charmed by what Dr Venu has done for them. “A senior has finally stuck his neck out and put his own job on the line for us,” a 2010 batch IAS official said.
Even five years before, a young officer fresh from training was invariably posted to what in bureaucratic circles is called “IAS sub-divisions”. It is the first rite of passage in the professional life of a civil servant; the test by fire.
“These are tough postings where young IAS officers are expected to do a more efficient job. Devikulam, Mananthawady, Ottappalam and Thalassery are some of these sub-divisions,” said the 2010 batch officer, who himself was first posted in Manathawady. Premkumar, a 2014 batch officer, was sub-collector in both Devikulam and Mananthawady.
“And then there are non-hassle sub-divisions that can be easily handled even by non-IAS revenue officials. In the last two three years, young IAS officers are seen to be posted in insignificant sub-divisions where their level of skills are not required. Worse still, non-IAS officers are being posted in cadre posts,” he added.
What is more disturbing is the fleeting nature of tenures. “In the last few years, many young officers did not last even four or five months in a post. They are caromed around like coins from one post to the other. The seniors just don't care,” the secretary-level officer said.
Civil servants know they are at the mercy of their political masters. Even then, there are certain procedures to be followed. According to rules, there is a two-year fixity of tenure. If a junior officer has to be removed before this, the recommendation has to first come before the Civil Services Board (CSB). The CSB should then seek the opinion of his senior, who in turn should talk to the junior who has been marked for removal.
None of these procedures were followed in Premkumar's case. A young IAS officer close to Premkumar said the Cabinet decision removing him as survey director came just hours after he had a long session with the revenue minister on how to tackle various questions in the Assembly. “For him, it was like a stab from the back. He has no idea what wrong he has done,” the young officer said.
The revenue principal secretary expressed his strong disapproval of this. In his missive to the chief secretary, Dr Venu said it was shocking that Premkumar was removed from the post “without any provocation or discernible reason”.
He also resented the fact that he was not taken into confidence before an officer under him was removed. “If there had been any complaint against him from any quarter, I should have been consulted as he reports to me,” Dr Venu said in the letter.
Many young officers have been lately casually treated and a sense of disenchantment has been growing. Earlier, IAS Association gatherings were the place where seniors used to spot latent misgivings in IAS colts. “It was easy to make these young chaps open up over a glass of beer,” the officer said. “Now, the Association is lifeless and there are small groups within the IAS fraternity with no links to each other,” the officer said.
When contacted, Dr Venu said he had nothing more to add than what had already been stated in his letter.