The State of Uttarakhand came into being on November 9, 2000, after a fairly long struggle, which was in many ways historic. The objective of the struggle was not to get separated from Uttar Pradesh, but to have better facilities for development and employment. People were convinced that unless a separate state was carved out, these things would not be possible.

Since I had been associated with the struggle for the formation of the state, I knew the aspirations of the people and expectations that they had from its Government. That is why, when I took over the reigns of Uttarakhand on March 8, 2007, I set certain targets for myself that involved three areas — stress on development activities, a corruption-free society and providing employment.

We inherited a severe financial crunch and a debt trap. The administrative system was derailed and corruption was rampant in the state. People had no faith in the government. First, our Government worked to revive the lost faith of people and bring the administrative system back on the track.

With financial discipline and austere measures, our Government succeeded in improving the financial condition of the state. Owing to it, we passed a ‘revenue surplus budget’ for the second consecutive year in 2008. During our 16-month tenure, I can claim no scandal or corruption was noticed.

We have sent a strong message to the people that we wouldn’t tolerate corruption. One of the initiatives taken in this line is transparent recruitment system. When we took over the reins of the state, there was total chaos in the administration and jobs were being sold openly. We got rid of the system of recommendations by doing away with the interview system. In order to ensure the examinee that he was being judged fairly, we introduced the concept of a carbon copy of the answer sheet which the examinee could take home. When the marks were put on board, the examinee could tally it with the carbon copy. In this manner, we filled up almost 24,000 Government posts in the first year itself.

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