New Delhi: In 2019, months after entering the government as a joint secretary through the Centre’s ambitious lateral entry scheme, one of the eight domain experts faced intense hostility and resistance from career civil servants.
“I was cornered from several quarters. For everything one proposed, the so-called system would come up with a laundry list of rules and restrictions that would make the proposal unviable,” the lateral entrant told ThePrint.
“Every rule or restriction makes someone in the system relevant, so they would keep throwing one rule after another,” the lateral entrant said, without giving details of the policy.
“Ultimately, the PMO (Prime Minister’s Office) had to step in. There was a very clear message from the PMO that the policy has to go through, and that is how we finally made it happen.”
The experience of the lateral entrant, who has now finished tenure in the government, sums up the government’s lateral entry experiment so far—a proactive political leadership and PMO keen to make the experiment a success amid resistance, and even hostility, from career civil servants, giving the overall sense that the scheme has been a mixed bag.
Last week, in a dramatic U-turn, the Modi government rolled back the scheme after it faced a massive political backlash from both the Opposition and its allies over the lack of reservations.
While the government has indicated that it would reintroduce the scheme with provisions for reservations, most insiders agree that its future hangs in the balance now.
“The response from the private sector with regard to the scheme has anyway been lukewarm,” an IAS officer, who was earlier with the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), told ThePrint.
“Joint secretary is a prestigious position, so people still apply…But nobody wants to leave their high-salaried jobs for director and deputy-secretary positions,” the official added. “In fact, one of the things lateral entrants brought up with the government is that they should be offered market salaries in the government.”
In 2018, when the government first announced the scheme and opened up 10 positions of joint secretary through lateral entry, it received over 6,000 applications. But, in 2021, when it opened up 40 positions—3 of joint secretary and the remaining for the positions of director and deputy secretary—it received just over 2,000 applications.
“Now, with reservation being added to the scheme, it is likely that the interest from the private sector would diminish further,” the official said.
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‘Did what we came to do’
According to Surendra Tripathi, director of the Indian Institute for Public Administration (IIPA), “The scheme has been a success.”
“All the secretaries wanted to retain the lateral entrants recruited in the first batch, and most of them had their tenures extended—that is an obvious indication that the scheme worked,” he said.
Under the scheme, lateral entrants were hired for an initial tenure of three years, which was extendable to five years. Of the 10 lateral entrants, who were initially appointed, nine joined the government.
One of the nine, Arun Goel, who was appointed in the commerce ministry, left in just over a year amid administrative tangles.
Of the remaining eight, Amber Dubey, who was appointed as the joint secretary in the civil aviation ministry, decided to return to the private sector after completing his three-year tenure. The tenures of the remaining seven were extended by another two years.
The government then announced more posts through lateral entry in three rounds in 2021 and 2023. Minister of State, DoPT, Jitendra Singh, told Parliament that the government has so far made 63 appointments through lateral entry, of which 57 were working in the Centre until July this year. Of these, most positions are those of directors and deputy secretaries.
“The scheme was a great success. Despite many hurdles, we were able to perform because we went in mission mode,” said the lateral entrant quoted above.
“We are so removed from the usual administrative games that IAS officers play internally, that we could actually focus on reforms…For instance, these guys cannot get over batches and cadre solidarities. We, on the other hand, could not care less about this, and actually work,” the lateral entrant added. “That is what is meant by fresh thinking…That you are not encumbered by the same ideas, internal logics, and competitions for 30 years of your career.”
Moreover, there is a “world of a difference” in how career civil servants and lateral entrants approached policy-making, the lateral entrant said.
“If a career civil servant has to make a policy, they would start with all the possible restrictions, and, then, try to find a way out of the legal maze,” the lateral entrant said. “In our case, we would start with a completely clean slate, make the policy, and, then, add the bare minimum restrictions to it, and not the other way round.”
A second lateral entrant said that they were able to make at least four policies and over a 100 notifications in their tenure. “The kind of pace and velocity that lateral entrants performed at was only possible with political support. My minister, for instance, was extremely forthcoming, and that obviously sent a message down to everyone.”
The first lateral entrant agreed.
“Right from the beginning, the PMO had told us that we are the first batch, and the success of the scheme would be judged on the basis of how we perform,” the lateral entrant said. “So, it was in their interest too, that we are allowed to work freely, and we are actually able to deliver.”
Lukewarm impact
Despite the sense of achievement felt by the lateral entrants who have already served in the government, the overall assessment of the reform has been lukewarm.
To begin with, the number of officers who have been recruited is considered too minuscule to have any institutional impact. “Ten joint secretaries cannot do much when they are surrounded by hundreds of IAS officers,” the first lateral entrant said.
“To make a difference, you need at least 10 percent of the total strength of officers in the central government to come through lateral entry…It is something we even suggested to the government in our interactions.”
According to sources in the government, some lateral entrants, especially those who came from the public sector, even expressed their desire to be made permanent in the government—a request turned down by the government.
A similar recommendation was made by the Group of Secretaries (GoS), which had initially recommended lateral entry in 2017.
According to documents seen by ThePrint, the GoS had suggested promoting lateral entrants to the level of additional secretaries or even inducting them into the IAS, or other civil services based on their performance. It also recommended that the government take 15 joint secretaries laterally every year for the following seven years in order to institutionalise the reform and tackle the problem of vacancies.
However, the most ambitious of these recommendations were not immediately taken up by the government because it was felt that a reform of this magnitude had to be implemented gradually.
There are other problems, too. As the former DoPT official said above, those successful in their careers in the private sector are less attracted by director- or deputy secretary-level jobs in the government. “The brightest of them do not want to leave their high-paying jobs for a position like deputy secretary, and if you are not attracting the brightest talent, then the scheme’s purpose cannot be fulfilled.”
One of the requests made by lateral entrants to the DoPT, in their informal interactions, was to raise their salaries to the market level, which, too, was not accepted by the government.
Now, there is the added problem of perception. One of the biggest attractions of the scheme under the first Modi government was the perception of a strong government which could get things done, said a second IAS officer. “But now, in lateral entry itself, the government has had to make a massive U-turn…People would be all the more reluctant to come in now.”
(Edited by Sanya Mathur)
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