Sunita Narain: Insured against change

DOWN TO EARTH

I never thought I would write in defence of the Indian state. But I am. The de-construction of the notion of public space and the practice of public service is evident and will cripple us enormously.

But I am also clear that re-construction will demand considerable innovation. We will be fooling ourselves if we believe that merely doing more of what we do now serves any purpose.

The state is vital. But today it is too full of blubber. It is this bulge "" in particular a bloated bureaucracy "" that needs to be revamped and re-strengthened so that the state can play its role effectively.

So that in this dog-eat-dog world, it can function as a true custodian of the public interest.

But let me first recapitulate what I wrote last fortnight. One, the state stands increasingly compromised, indeed decimated, in terms of its capacities.

Two, the state is abdicating its role in favour of a growing and powerful private sector, which is now expected to provide everything from water to health security.

Three, even as the state hands over its productive functions, it ensures its perpetuation, for its own sake or for the sake of the crumbs it doles out in the form of jobs to the poor.

Four, the weakened system profits the rich, continuing to subsidise them in the name of the poor.

And five, in all this, state functionaries are ironically the single-largest beneficiaries of this dissipation as they gain by having more, even as they do less.

Their perks and powers are intact. The state's stateliness is preserved with a pomp it does not deserve, all for the sake of appearance.

How will the state be driven to work? First, I we need to ascertain, quite literally, the role of government. This issue cannot be taken for granted anymore.

We need to clarify what its role will be, so far as basic services, education and health and basic needs, water and food are concerned. We also must clarify the government's role as the public-interest regulator.

This clarity of purpose is vital. For today, most government action is taken in a mindless and heartless manner. Government agencies have turned into paper pushers; they fiddle with procedures and budgets, without knowing why or what it is that they are doing. Government has become one-large bloated clerkdom.

Then, we need to plug its weaknesses. We need to critique its failures. For instance, we must accept that public agencies today seriously lack expertise to manage change.

We cannot continue to protect the inefficient and incompetent in the name of the public. Take water services. Everyone will agree that clean and safe water is a must for all.

Yet, everyone will also agree that public institutions are not delivering this basic need. Therefore, as the state falters, the private sector steps in.

Today, large parts of rich urban India drink bottled water. Remember, this is the water that the private entrepreneur does not pay for, but simply rips off the aquifer, cleans (to some extent) and then bottles to deliver to homes.

It's a rip off. But it services a need. The health costs of unsafe water are deadly for the poor. And in all this, the battered public services continue to provide subsidy to the water and sewage of the rich. Everyone will agree this is unacceptable.

But what everyone will not agree upon is the way ahead. Some will argue for public-private partnership, for them a euphemism for private takeover of the publicly-created facility.

They believe in downsizing the state. Others will argue for control of the public institution: there should be no talk of private capital and certainly no talk of capitalist tools such as pricing of water or fiscal regulations.

As I see it, both are right, to an extent. The public-proponents are right in saying that the public purpose of the water service must be maintained.

But the private-proponents are also right when they say the public institution is weak in capacity and expertise.

The Delhi Jal Board, for instance, has roughly 25,000 employees, far in excess of what it needs to discharge its functions as a public water utility.

But what is even worse is that this is a workforce without expertise. Therefore, to do anything at all technical, innovative or specialised, it needs to call in external consultants. It needs external help because it cannot fix what it has within. Simply, it is easier to bypass than to reform.

Such a lack of expertise is a serious problem because it forces a silent takeover by parties that possess some knowledge but lots of vested interest.

In all this, the role of the state as public regulator is grossly compromised because it just does not possess the ability to negotiate on behalf of public policy.

In other words, the reform of public institutions will demand strengthening of its knowledge capacities. How will this be done? It is often mistakenly said, given the chimera of our software business, that we are a knowledge society.

In fact, we must realise that we are increasingly a knowledge-proof society. Public institutions are immune to knowledge. In fact, I would say, they are insured against it.