A steel frame or a straitjacket?

The government has accepted the recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission, more than doubling the salaries of our ruthless masters, the civil service. A salary of Rs 7,000 per month jumps to Rs 18,000 and a salary of Rs 90,000 per month jumps to an eye-watering Rs 250,000. Civil servants are fond of comparing their salaries with the private sector, conveniently ignoring the humongous hidden benefits, which are free medical care for life, including treatment abroad at taxpayers expense, with attendant, pension for life, which will also jump with this award, and, the most humongous of all, they are never sacked, unless someone has been absent from duty for 24 years. Cost to the taxpayer? Over Rs 1 trillion, which will put a strain on the budget deficit and increase inflation. Politicians are putting a brave face on it by saying that it will increase demand, which will stimulate growth, and increase tax revenues, both direct, because they will be paying income tax at a higher rate, and indirect, because they will spend more on goods and services. We can understand paying higher salaries to the army, who risk their lives for the nation, and the police, who risk their lives to keep us safe, but to give such enormous salaries to a bunch of autocrats, who sit in air-conditioned offices which we enter with folded hands, after going 'through proper channel', begging for services which are ours by right. Or 'shake hands' under the table. Are we being too harsh? An officer of the Indian Administrative Service, the aristocrats of the civil service, writes a spirited defence of his colleagues. The lower ranks are corrupt but cannot be punished because they are unionised. Business fellows slander honest officers if denied lucrative government contracts or expensive land. He lists honest officers who were punished for daring to take on criminal politicians. But then he asks us to understand "the puissant interplay of self-interest, perceived self-interest, self-preservation, ideology, maybe even inchoate experiences that shape his thoughts and actions". Sorry, that is no excuse. Get out and take your chances in the private sector. What is the excuse for mistreating disabled athletes or wasting Rs 1 billion aid for flood victims on food and drinks? The CBI reckons that over 2,400 top officials are corrupt. No wonder that the Indian bureaucracy is rated the worst in Asia. Because status quo is so beneficial to them they resist any reform on the specious excuse that they maybe investigated, leading to 'policy paralysis'. The IAS is a continuation of the ICS and still functions as a colonial power. Even Nehru could not reform it. The only way is to close the IAS school in Mussoorie. Appoint officers directly and train them on the job, as is done in all other professions. Apparently, Sardar Partel called the IAS the steel frame of India. They have become a straitjacket on the nation.