Not only do they fail to do this but they draw circles around ministers and chief ministers by devising systems so convoluted that only they know how to work them. I recently heard that a major infrastructure project was delayed because of a file that moved from the minister to the cabinet secretary, the finance secretary, the environment secretary, the PWD secretary then back up again and down again. Why? Vital projects remain in suspended animation because of this mysterious method of functioning. If bureaucrats wanted things to change they would change, but obfuscation and rotational processes suit them because it gives them a hold over the politicians they work for.

It’s time for things to change. The first urgent change that needs to be made is to make it possible to sack bureaucrats who squander taxpayers’ money by delaying major public projects. Officials caught causing needless delays must lose their jobs. The second change that needs to be made urgently is to order our brilliant IAS types to devise simpler, more modern methods of governance. It’s time for us to demand change. It’s time to remind our bureaucrats that the age of the burra sahib is gone and that they are in the end servants of the people of India.