Modi
government is in place. But various parties
of the coalition are angry or peeved.
One guy is (obviously prompted by his party) is not taking charge –
trying to twist the arm of the PM through a public blackmail!
News reports
are talking about weighty ministries.
Some prefer to call them “plum” posts (I hope PG Wodehouse will pardon
them – “Rum, I say, that these chappies think of dragging my name even here”). It leaves me wondering as to what is plum
about these ministries.
Ministries
like finance, defence are considered important by everyone around. So the bureaucracy would only post the smart,
intelligent and best officers to these departments. So the quality of the notes and decisions which
a minster would find on his desk would be better, needing less of his
brains. By and large the decision making
processes is set, needing far less effort on his part (A war may make things
different and in such cases, the decision would move to the PMO, I suppose) and
most of the critical/decision would go to the cabinet anyway.
Let us look
at the less plum jobs. Say, Women and
Child Development or Consumer Affairs etc.
These are places where poor quality bureaucrats are posted and you have
to push them to work. Clearly, you need
some energy to make things work here. And it is here that the society and
public at large are going to be impacted directly by the changes and innovation
that the minister can bring in.
To my mind,
then a minster posted to these positions has to bring in more verve and better
skills than those who get plum posts.
Plum,
therefore, is a euphemism for the TV exposure you will get (and therefore
improve your chances of getting re-elected and move on to the PMs chair) or it
is the weighty because of the suitcases that are brought to you? How else would a department like civil
aviation be more critical to India than Department of Social Welfare? How come
HRD has suddenly become very important? Because
of the private players in education who can “pay” for permissions or it is
possible to dole out permissions to your party supporters or worse still you
your caste kinsmen?
By repeating
the word plum, news anchors are doing us disfavour. They are bringing in the
undercurrents a certain legitimacy. It
is a fight for spoils. Let us not
plaster over the money making saying “it is plum” because it is somehow more
important.
