AS THE working class the world over was celebrating this year's May Day, a conglomerate of workers' organisations, called the National Campaign for Eradication of Inequality, is reported to have submitted a memorandum to the President requesting him inter alia to direct the Central government to immediately suspend the Sixth Pay Commission announced for the revision of salaries and allowances of its employees (The Hindu, May 2).
It is well known that the people at large are unhappy with the government servants. But when a sizable section of the working class itself raises the banner of revolt against them, the time has come for the latter to ponder why it should be so.
Although all major political parties have floated their unions among the government employees, a fairly large segment of them appears to be in the unions of Leftist persuasion, particularly in Kerala and West Bengal. Interestingly, the Leftists are increasingly becoming disenchanted with the work ethics of these employees and the resultant malfunctioning of the government administration.
Surprise inspections conducted by Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan in the State Secretariat showed a large number of employees missing from their seats during office hours.
This is not an isolated case of Kerala alone. Years ago the then Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, stated that the Central government employees, instead of attending to their work, play cards at the India Gate lawns.
In the January-February 2007 issue of Social Scientist, Prabhat Patnaik, deputy chairman of the Kerala Planning Board, brings out in a paper the change in the attitude of the government personnel before and after the introduction of neo-liberal policies in the country. Some of his comments are too serious to ignore.
First, during the early post-independence period, a substantial section of the state personnel, drawn essentially from the lower middle class, was antagonistic to the big bourgeoisie. Influenced by the Nehruvian dirigiste ideology, these personnel saw that the commitment to state capitalism helped them in their advancement. Today's state personnel, influenced by the neo-liberal policies dictated by the Bretton Woods institutions, are more interested in working for the big bourgeoisie and the global financial capital.
Secondly, the state personnel are least bothered about discharging their normal duties today. For example, Prof. Patnaik noted, "in Kerala, Wayanad is one of the poorer districts which has witnessed the maximum number of peasant suicides. A number of `packages' of Central assistance have been announced for this district. But very few officers are willing to go to this district as District Collectors or Medical Officers, or to take charge of educational establishments. Money lies unspent... What is true of Wayanad is true of other poorer districts of Kerala, and what is true of Kerala is certainly true of other States as well."
Thirdly, the state personnel are not only averse to implementing anti-poverty programmes but also disinterested in running the public sector units. That is why these units have become financially unviable and provide justification for their privatisation. When it comes to taking up the so-called "developmental projects" relating to the `infrastructure' sector, the same personnel show extra interest, as these are a source of land speculation.
In India, any ordinary citizen who visits a government office for a public utility service will know that the bureaucracy is corrupt. The big bourgeoisie and the global finance capital, while using merrily the devotion that the bureaucracy showers on them are, at another level, pushing for outsourcing and privatisation of public service.
The recent experience of Kerala would show that when it comes to that stage, only the common people, whom the bureaucracy treats with disdain, come to their rescue.
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