Uttar Pradesh’s bureaucrats and technocrats were on Tuesday asked to pull up their socks by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav and State PWD Minister Shivpal Singh Yadav, who said no amount of disciplining will help them to improve if they do not have the intention.
“What I have come to understand is that IAS stands for ‘Individuals After Sarkar’ They can do anything for their posting... But there are some good officers as well because of whom good results can be seen.”
“It is our responsibility to see how they can be used,” Mr. Yadav told reporters after launching 1,020 tubewells across the State by pressing a button at his residence here.
Not sparing the engineers, the Chief Minister said they will continue to do what they have been doing and no amount of disciplining would help if they don’t have honesty in their hearts.
Quoting socialist thinker Ram Manohar Lohia, Mr. Yadav said that until a bad person was not called bad, the “bad practice” cannot be kept under check.
“It is not as if engineers are not good ...If we have to make progress, the engineers will have to come forward and work towards it,” Mr. Yadav said adding that hurdles will crop up while running the government.
Earlier, State PWD and Irrigation Minister Shivpal Singh Yadav even more harsh words to say for the bureaucrats with him warning that FIRs will be lodged against those who do not improve.
In his inimitable style, the U.P. minister, also the brother of Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, lamented that the bureaucrats, especially in the forest and finance department, were “creating hurdles“.
Incidentally, both these portfolios are held by the CM.
“Though I have disciplined engineers, they still continue to indulge in certain things which I am trying to rectify,” the minister said warning that some of them, if they do not improve will have to be jailed by lodging FIRs.
“When I am not posing problems in their functioning... they should perform,” Shivpal said and expressed wonder why engineers were not interested in taking up big projects.
Commenting on Principal Secretary (Irrigation) Deepak Singhal, who recently had been awarded the title of “water administrator” by an organisation, Shivpal said the bureaucrat’s frequent visits abroad should be fruitful in bringing some works and technology to the State.
Remarking on Shivpal’s severe criticism of bureaucrats and engineers, Mr. Yadav quipped: “Aaj chacha ne bade mood mein bhashan diya” (Uncle was in a complete mood to give a speech like this).
Mr. Yadav assured all possible help in the revival and cleaning of six rivers - Gomti in Lucknow, Hindon in Ghaziabad, Sengar and Anaya in Mainpuri, Chandrawal in Banda and Lekhari in Jhansi, and the setting up of a water resources knowledge centre in the State.
Commenting on his term so far as Chief Minister, he said: “Like we learn how to place goods in a refrigerator or how much the nuts and bolts need to be tightened, I took some time being a first-time Chief Minister. But have now learnt it in three-and-a-half years.”
