by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group
Dr Manmohan Singh was a “Lateral entrant” in 1972, says Govt.
"We are following a better policy” asserts PMO
Harish Gupta
New Delhi, July 4
The government showed the mirror to the Opposition parties on the question of “lateral entrants” in the bureaucracy directly saying previous governments appointed as many as 20 persons directly. Giving out details, the government said even Dr Manmohan Singh was brought in 47 years ago in 1972 as Chief Economic Adviser and made Finance Secretary in 1976.
As if this was not enough, the government today riggled out details of many such lateral entrants including Montek Singh Ahluwalia who was appointed as Economic Adviser in 1979, Vijay L. Kelkar as Secretary in Petroleum ministry in 1994 and later Finance Secretary in 1998 and Bimal Jalan as Finance Secretary in 1991. Dr. Shankar Acharya was appointed as Chief Economic Advisor in 1993 and Rakesh Mohan as Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs in 2004 and Arvind Virmani as Chief Economic Advisor in the Ministry of Finance, in the year 2007. Shri Ram Vinay Shahi was appointed as Secretary in the Ministry of Power in 2002.
The government responded when the issue was raised by the Opposition parties in the Rajya Sabha questioning the rational behind the move to bring 40 lateral entrants in one go without any norms etc.
The Prime Minister, Narendra Modi was present when the issue was raised. But he fielded his junior Dr Jitendra Singh, MoS in the PMO who strongly defended it saying such practice existed for decades together and the Modi government had inducted only six or seven persons.
Dr Singh made it clear that while no norms were followed earlier in bringing the lateral entrants, the Modi government wants to bring in the best of the talent from whichever source available and to augment the availability of the personnel. “We have only streamlined the process” he added.
He said the earlier governments did it with the best of the intentions. “Now, this has to be further streamlined because we gain by experience and also learn to improve with the passage of time.” The process was conducted through Union Public Service Commission and for ten posts of Joint Secretary, more than 6000 applications came.
Manas Ranjan Bhutia and D Raja questioned the Modi government's move to hire directly at the level of Deputy secretary and above through NITI Aayog and UPSC.
