The administration of the British era was essentially for the perpetuation of imperial interest and not for the welfare of people. Hence it had the inherently elitist, secretive and irresponsive attitude around it. With it came non responsiveness, bureaucratic delay and red tapism thereby widening the gap between the administration and the common people. Also during the early years of independence the people were completely dependent on government for the provisioning of most goods and services which left the common man at the mercy of the civil services.

Body:

Since Independence, there have been covert and overt changes in administration. The need arose for administrative reforms as people become more aware and their aspirations increased. Also, there was an enormous increase in the scale of the governmental operations. There has been a change in the role of civil servants with evolving changes and challenges in the society.

The politico economic transition:

• With the opening of the economy in 1991 and the forces of privatization ushering in the administration could not remain unaffected.
• It had to respond to the changed demands from the government and the functional versatility expected out of it.
• For instance, the BSNL or Air India being the sole operators in the field suddenly faced competition from private players.
• Now the administration had to look after efficiency and effectiveness along with economy and equity.
• An altogether new set of functions started cropping up for the civil servants such as being part of Tribunals, Regulatory bodies and independent commissions.
• This transition made the civil servants play the role of a watch dog than that of the service provider.

The ICT wave:

• The wave of Internet and communication technology has deeply touched even the smallest details of our life.
• In this era of information overload and enhanced accessibility how can the civil services be rigidly working through their non transparent and inwardly looking silos?
• ICT has ushered in an ease of doing routine work such as file management, record keeping and highly cut down the interaction time.
• This has left the civil servants with time to better focus on the actual developmental and welfare oriented work that the constitutional ethos expects them to do.
• With ICT has come in a lot of accountability, better opportunities for people to monitor work or participate through different platforms and thus making the civil servants and their work come into common public scrutiny.

The era of participation:

• Seventy years since the independence and India has leaped high on its literacy and social awareness paradigms.
• From legislations like The Right to Information Act to “Maximum Governance , Minimum Government” agendas, from political manifestos of transparency, accountability to social media stepping into governance, popular participation in democratic functioning of the nation is the demand of the day.
• In this era the administration cannot act as the sole decision maker and has to work in cooperation with the political heads and the people as well thus acting as a bridge.

Collaborative actions:

• With the passage of time, the role of civil society organisations, in governance, has increased with demands for better governance.
• The same can be said of the private sector, which is increasingly providing services in several areas, which hitherto were the exclusive preserve of the public sector.
• Consequently, civil servants should view civil society organisations and the private sector as partners in the process of the country’s governance

Way forward:

• Any attempt to re-engineer the bureaucracy would have to deal with two aspects.
• The first would have to address the systems or structures and the other would have to be the professional or attitudinal aspects of civil servants.
• No civil service structure can be static in its character. It has to be dynamic and has to change with the times.
• A professional, socially relevant, empathetic and empowering civil service is the thing of the time.

Conclusion:

Thus we see that the role of civil servants has evolved from being an elite and inward looking cog in the administrative wheel to being the facilitator of welfare services on one hand and promoting free market ethos on the other and further needs to become the proactive handler of change. Newer challenges of environmental degradation, nuclear threats, social unrest, terrorism, population pressure and the need of transparency, accountability , equity and participation is at the doorstep. Now the role of a civil servant is not only that of a service provider but a torch bearer of change and a social stabiliser