When lateral means panic.

"On Sunday, the Narendra Modi government took its first step towards fulfilling a goal it had set in 2014. That was when the Centre mooted the idea of allowing lateral entry from academia and the private sector at the joint secretary level," wrote an editorial in the Mint. Normally all top civil service posts are reserved for Indian Administrative Service, IAS, officers, which is a kind of 'closed shop', where promotion is according to length of service and "belonging to the same caste as the chief minister's base". The IAS is a continuation of the Indian Civil Service which was set up by the British to subjugate Indians. Charles Cornwallis has the honor of being known as the 'Father of Civil Service in India'. Hence the IAS still functions as a colonial force, keeping the people in check. What started out as a "steel frame" for India has transformed into a "steel cage". To be fair, "they have been employed to perverse effect by a political elite that finds a subservient bureaucracy useful". By what means? "These range from transfers to changing a post's functions to make it a de facto demotion." One year before general elections the Prime Minister has suddenly decided to recruit people to the highest posts of the civil service from outside the IAS. This has been labeled 'lateral entry'. This government has been very good to IAS officers, accepting recommendations of the Seventh Pay Commission without challenge and even allowing them to accept gifts, having forbidden them previously. Our GDP grew at 7.7% in the last quarter, making us the fastest growing major economy in the world. Which surely means that our administration has been functioning like a well oiled machine. Why this sudden necessity for lateral entry? "This is critical as the first step towards a broad-based institutionalisation of a wider and deeper talent pool focusing on specific skill-sets that fill the existing absence of talent in the government, tailored to the particular sector and enhanced by the industry-specific work experience that the lateral entry admissions will possess," said A Kant, CEO of Niti Aayog, supposedly think-tank for the government. The Ministry of External Affairs has apparently hired 12 experts as advisers but they do not have powers to make decisions, so it will most likely be a waste of time and taxpayer money. So things are not as smooth as we have been told. The total failure of attempts to sell Air India has left the government with a lot of egg on its face and the copper plant in Tuticorin has been permanently shut down reducing our copper output by half, after shooting 14 protesters to death. Time to panic?