Introduce diversity in languages for civil services tests

In the subcontinent, people are inquisitive about origins. While this line of inquiry may appear ‘backward’ to modern-urban types, this is one of the more dependable ways in which humans have always tried to know what lies beneath public pretension – ‘castelessness’ of high-caste Hindus is a useful example. We must remember that Indian Army’s institutional father is the British Indian Army. Only then the duty of ‘our’ men in Kashmir becomes clear. Any torture victim of the Police may do well to remember that its institutional father is the Imperial Police, a force designed to terrorise the population when they dissent and to protect legal and illegal rights of the powerful. The Indian Administrative Service’s (IAS) father was called the Imperial Civil Service. When a few thousand college graduates with top-ratings in the dowry bazaar ‘administer’ a billion plus people, with their children navigating the Delhi-Mumbai-New York-London dhanda networks – spanning pimping, business, politics, culture, arts and ethnic marts, the ‘I’ in Imperial overshadows these technically ‘I’=’Indian’ times. 

Over the last few years, the proportion of successful IAS candidates from a subcontinental language medium background has decreased drastically. It is shameful that one doesnt need to exhibit proficiency in any subcontinental language to join the elite cadre. Natives continue to remain excluded. Among recent changes to the preliminary examination pattern, the Civil Service Aptitude Test (CSAT) has drawn particular ire from Hindi-medium aspirants. Some CSAT questions are exclusively in English; Hindi translation is available for the rest. It’s important to note that not a single CSAT question or common components of preliminary/main examinations are available in non-Hindi mother-tongues. 

Pappu, Akhilesh, Sharad and other ideologically-lapsed upper and middle Gangetic children, grandchildren and grand-dacoits paraded in Lohia’s Hindi cause. Hindi-wallahs who don’t raise any voice about Hindi-imposition and propagation in non-Hindi regions by Union government subsidy suddenly want to project all desi mother-tongue wallahs as the wronged party in the CSAT controversy. Solidarity is not a one-way street and it can be restored only when all 22 languages of the Eighth schedule of the constitution are treated equally in the Indian Union for all government purposes. This includes holding UPSC examinations in all 22 languages at every stage.

How will non-English types conduct affairs in English language dominated international diplomacy? Those functions of the Union government, including external affairs that unquestionably need mastery in English can have their own English-compulsory exam. Better still, people can be trained to learn English along with wine-glass holding training. This matters goes beyond language. If Narendra Modi is actually serious about his alleged championing of federalism, the government should take this opportunity to revisit the Union and Concurrent lists with the objective of transferring items to the state list. Administrators from Hindi, Marathi, Tamil, Kannada, etc speaking regions can manage their affairs in their respective areas as they have done for centuries before the Union was commissioned by the Constituent Assembly apparently for public service. This diverse public needs public institutions and public servants who represent this diversity by being socio-culturally pre-rooted in regions they serve. The Delhi-centric rootless classs cannot have a self-serving veto. Do we really need the IAS beyond the English-mandatory services, given that the states have their own civil service cadres well-versed in the state language(s)?

English-centric IAS is exclusionary by design. The state civil services are rooted hence more inclusive. Fostering rooted diversity is a better guarantee for the Union’s integrity than tanks and guns. Taming and governing natives by sending in socio-cultural outsiders, be they soldiers or administrators, is so 1857. 

The author is a Bengal-based commentator on politics and culture @gargac