Babudom incorporated

The Man Who Slept Too Much may not have done the country any favours. But he has, indirectly, helped the Petroleum Ministry. Strange as that may sound, Arjun Singh’s Reservations bomb relegated to the back pages what would normally have been on Page One: the ouster of Subir Raha.

During his five years at the helm of ONGC, Raha was one of the most respected CEOs of any corporate entity in the country. Yet with two years to go to his retirement, the man was denied the extension which should rightfully have been his. Is there so much talent in our public sector enterprises that a man as brilliant as Raha can so summarily be dispensed with?

That question, by the way, is rhetorical and doesn’t need an answer: the paucity of strong leadership in PSUs in hardly news. The reason for this lack of talent isn’t only because of salaries. The reason is that the Rahas of the world aren’t wanted in the first place, and if they— by some aberration —do take over the reins of a PSU, the knives are out to get them.

Mani Shankar Aiyar is intelligent, astute and hard working and his stewardship of the Petroleum ministry went far beyond the routine. But there was one blot on Aiyar’s reign at the ministry, and that blot was his treatment of Raha.

What that shows is that even someone of Aiyar’s calibre falls into the trap of the Territorial Imperative: bureaucrats of every ministry fight dirty to keep their territory. It’s as if each ministry is a country in itself, with well-defined borders, strict immigration controls and the most rigid visa requirements. Any PSU is certainly considered as part of ministry territory, and its head is therefore supposed to kow-tow to its senior officers. Subir Raha didn’t, so everyone wanted him out. That included Mani Shankar Aiyar. All said and done, he is an ex IFS man, and old habits die hard.

There are three important points to look at in the Raha case. One relates to the appointment of two additional government directors on ONGC’s board which Raha fought tooth and nail. Why was Petroleum Secretary SC Tripathi insisting on this when there were already three government directors on the board? Obviously, the greater numbers would have completely emasculated Raha, and brought him totally under the ministry’s control.

The second point was about Tripathi’s attempt to separate the MRPL refinery from ONGC’s control. although ONGC had acquired it. Obviously, hiving it off would have put it directly under the ministry’s control and create new positions for bureaucrats to occupy.

The third relates to a large project in Mangalore. Tripathi’s contention was that this was done without the ministry’s approval; Raha hotly disputes this. Both miss the point that the insistence on executive decisions being okayed by the ministry undermines the PSU’s autonomy.

But, then, what’s new? The hounding of Michael Mascerenhas, who had done a marvelous job as Managing Director of Air India, is another case in point. His only sin was that he was a Cambridge man, not an IAS one. The moment he was out, an IAS official was appointed to the post. An objective question would be: Who would be better? An expert who has spent a lifetime in the business, especially a business as complex as running an airline, or a generalist who knows a bit about a lot of things? The answer is clear to everyone, except those who add the three letters, IAS, after their names.

Apart from destabilising non-IAS incumbents appointed by the Public Enterprises Selection Board, another tactic employed by the bureaucracy is to delay the PESB process: if no one is appointed, guess who runs the PSU? Why a Joint Secretary of the related ministry of course! The ONGC chairmanship, for example, is now vacant, and no doubt will continue to be so for a while. As it happens, there are as many as 20 high level positions to which no appointments have been made even though rules specify that selection should start three months before a post falls vacant. Yet, in spite of PSEB reminders, eight ministries have not given  essential details without which no hiring is possible. The vacancies include Chairman of SAIL; Managing Director of the Bhilai Steel Plant; Marketing Director of National Fertilisers; Chairman & Managing Director of Coal India…

Perhaps it’s time for the Prime Minister to step out of the Arjun Singh induced stupor and take a decisive first step. And that first step will be to cut each ministry to size.