Such a long official journey

Bureaucrats write about their experiences in government only when they are reasonably sure that they no longer stand a chance of being picked up for a fresh assignment. G V Ramakrishna, a 1952 batch IAS officer belonging to the Andhra Pradesh cadre, retired in 1988.

But that did not mark the end of his career in government. Ramakrishna was entrusted with half a dozen more assignments that kept him busy till last year. The volume under review thus seems to be an indication that Ramakrishna has finally called it a day after 51 years of service in government. That in itself is a rare achievement and testimony to his credentials as an upright, competent, and a highly durable officer.

In the years after his retirement, different political parties formed governments at the Centre. But for most of them Ramakrishna continued to remain a favourite candidate as he bagged many of the prized jobs in the government during this period.

After a short stint as an advisor to the Tamil Nadu Governor, P C Alexander, he was sent to Brussels as India's Ambassador to the European Union in 1988 by the Congress government. In 1990, the National Front government of V P Singh brought him back as the chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi).

Even as his tenure became a little controversial, the P V Narasimha Rao government accommodated him as a member of the Planning Commission in 1994. And then the United Front government in 1996 appointed him as the chairman of the Disinvestment Commission for a three-year term that ended in 1999. His final assignment with the government was as the chairman of the Construction Industry Development Council, which ended in June 2003.

For a man who started his working life as a chemist with the Rockefeller Foundation, a career in government gave him an insight into the way the state apparatus is run by politicians and deals are made. Ramakrishna's experiences give us a fair idea of all this. What he also reveals in the process is that his uprightness and down-to-earth approach to many issues may have made him a difficult officer, not just with his politician bosses, but also with his colleagues.

The highlight of the book, of course, is not the friction he had with different ministers, but the chapter on his stint as petroleum secretary in the latter half of the 1980s, when he managed to fight powerful political forces within and outside the Prime Minister's Office.

His victory in that battle ensured that the controversial turnkey contract for the 1,700-km long Hazira-Bijaipur-Jagdishpur (HBJ) pipeline project went to the French-Japanese consortium of Spie Capag, Toyo Engineering and NKK, and not to Snam Progetti of Italy, in spite of the latter's influential India representative, Ottavio Quattrocci, and his powerful connections with the PMO.

Indeed it was a rare occasion when the combined might of several powerful politicians and ministers had to bow before the dogged persistence of a group of officials led by Ramakrishna and ably supported by the cabinet secretary, P K Kaul. He narrates with relish several interesting incidents involving the project and how a review of the original decision was forced, but to no avail.

Just on the day the agreement was to be signed with the French-Japanese consortium, the PMO sent for the file for another review. The file was returned to the petroleum ministry only a week later, forcing the cancellation of the scheduled signing ceremony.

Even after the contract was signed, the Prime Minister showed special interest in the execution of the project, calling for a review of its implementation on eight occasions. But every time a review meeting was organised, it was cancelled at short notice.

In sharp contrast, the chapter on his stint as the chairman of Sebi is quite boring and often vain. In spite of being in the thick of a securities scam, he fails to throw fresh light on the controversy. He of course makes no secret of his deep reservations about those who "had great enthusiasm for liberalisation in all fields". No prizes for guessing them. They included Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Ashok V Desai. He has also been less than candid about the manner in which his tenure as Sebi chairman came to an end amidst a controversy over the length of his tenure and his decision to ban badla trading and impose registration fees on brokers.

But a leopard does not change his spots. At the height of the sugar import controversy in the 1990s, the commerce minister, Pranab Mukherjee, wanted Ramakrishna (who was then Planning Commission member) to head an inquiry committee. Ramakrishna asked Mukherjee if the government would accept a "fair and impartial" inquiry. That was the end of it. The inquiry was later headed by an official from the Comptroller and Auditor General's Office.

His views on the Enron deal, the power policy, and the Oman gas pipeline project were all against those of the establishment at that time. Even as the chairman of the Disinvestment Commission, he had retained his innate character of a rebel. He questioned the terms of reference of the Commission and felt let down when he was denied the powers to suo motu recommend cases for disinvestment. He also had strong views on disinvestment in the oil sector. But these got lost in the BJP government's desire to push ahead with a selective privatisation of some PSUs.

The book recounts many difficult moments Ramakrishna faced with his politician bosses. The list is long and includes the minister of state for industry, Dr Charanjit Chanana, a known protege of Sanjay Gandhi, the energy minister, Shiv Shankar, who wanted a say in the way the coal companies placed their equipment orders, and the Andhra Pradesh chief minister, N T Rama Rao, who was upset over the manner in which Ramakrishna settled a mining strike without waiting for the Telugu Desam supremo to return to the state and gain political mileage out of it. In all these cases, Ramakrishna was either shifted out or he himself sought a transfer.

In spite of being so difficult and unyielding, Ramakrishna spent more than 50 years in important positions in the government. That he survived for so long is a comment as much on him as on the system's ability to provide room for those who think differently and may not always toe the line mandated by the establishment.

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TWO SCORE AND TEN: MY EXPERIENCES IN GOVERNMENT

G V Ramakrishna
Academic Foundation
Price: Rs 595, Pages: 370