"Random Thoughts" on the phenomena of corruption among Government Servants

Today there was a news report regarding the involvement of some military generals in a scam related to procurement of some cereals, pulses to be precise, which were meant for the consumption of the troops. It seems poor quality cereals had been procured and there were some purported financial misdeeds in which the generals had indulged for their own benefit, and in the process had become guilty of some sort of delinquency. This particular news item has put me in a contemplative mood.
Well, the first thought that comes to mind is why there is so much corruption. Second, how do we define corruption – certainly there are service rules governing the behaviour of all and sundry who are employed in any kind of organization- transgression of the service rules particularly the ones defining financial dealings definitely makes you corrupt in legal terms. But why do we have to resort to such strait jacketing and such stringent rules? And then again why there is no allowance for the microscopic minority among a class of crass mediocre who perform much better than the masses? By performance I do not mean just the performance of formal duties which are more often than not superficial in nature, but certainly much beyond that.
I fervently believe that the root cause of corruption, primarily among government servants is the complete absence of any positive discrimination between the brilliant performers, the mediocre and the non-performers. There are a number of pointers-
1. It is no secret that the performance appraisal system, as of now, in vogue in Government Service is absolutely abysmal. It is a complete farce and at times it is used for vindictive purposes by the superiors.
2. The seniority is the basic and in almost all cases the only criterion for promotion. This is basically because of the farcical performance appraisal system.
3. The salary is dependent on seniority and rank and has absolutely no connection whatsoever with performance. Off course there is no scope for performance based incentive / bonus etc. Traces of socialism!!
Now coming to the main discussion, in the scenario as outlined above, any intelligent and capable employee will have just four options-
1. Shun all high risk but potentially highly beneficial behaviour connected with his work arena. This is so because in any case he does not stand to benefit if his decisions and actions turn out to be good but in case there is any kind of loss or notional loss there is a risk of a severe rap on the knuckles. The risk is not balanced with any benefit. All risk no gain.
2. Get in the groove of mediocrity, become a non-performer. This is a safe and sound option. No risk and no gain, but well, in any case there was no scope for any gain in the first place. No risk no gain but safe and secure.
3. Embrace the risks not only the ones related to actions which may have the potential for benefits to the organization or to the group of people whom the organization serves but also towards his own personal benefits. Well, this is the beginning of corruption as defined by the various statutes.
4. In exceptional cases one who has already climbed through the various steps as defined by Maslow towards the need for self actualization may just forget about any positive discrimination and resultant personal benefit and still take the risks and perform. But in majority of such cases, anecdotal reportage does indicate that need for social acceptance, although of a higher order than ordinarily defined by Maslow does operate and becomes the motivating factor. In any case this class is extremely miniscule and does not hold much relevance. Such people are initially eulogized by the media and thereafter either their superiors who are more often than not their detractors force them out of the scene or they simply fade away. The Don Quixotes.
Well, at the moment the context of the discussion is corruption and here we are concerned with the employee who exercises the third option. And here lies the irony – in fact the irony is that for a normal human being who is competent, intelligent and reasonably motivated, there is, in fact no other option, but the third option.
Even otherwise, it is very difficult, rather impossible to curb the basic economic and business instincts. The activity of looking for and making a profit is a normal instinct and will always remain intact. The only way out is to reward such actions of an employee which bring profit to the organization. By profit, I do not mean just monetary profit but profit in a wider sense. Again by reward I do not mean immediate monetary reward but definitely some tangible reward measurable in terms of monetary benefit and having some relationship with the performance and definitely within some well defined time frame.
In any case what I am advocating is neither an original idea nor a purely theoretical design. These practices are well established in the private sector where performance incentives constitute a larger proportion of the pay package than the fixed component. In fact this is the tool which keeps the huge army of dealers and traders employed by stock broking firms, forex trading banks, commodity traders, bond traders etc. from straying. In most cases there is a transparent system of giving incentives so that the employee is not only motivated to perform but also to ensure that he keeps the benefits of the employer as the sole target. This is so because the employees’ personal benefits and the employer’s benefits not only converge but the relationship between the two is also defined.
As far as Government Servants are concerned there is no way that corruption can be rooted out. The reasons are simple- firstly as the situation has come to be derived there is no way that the pay packages of this group of employee can be rationalized. Secondly there is a complete divergence between the magnitude of authority that this group exercises and the compensation (in legitimate monetary terms) it receives. Thirdly the gulf between the legitimate financial status of this group vis-à-vis the group with which it tries to compare or benchmark itself will keep on widening – result of the buoyant economy and growing income disparities.
There are some noises being made regarding the constitution of the Sixth Pay Commission but the dominant noise is that whatever little it may or may not be able to do towards rationalization of the pay packages of Government Employees, it will definitely cripple the Government finances. Well, so be it, please do not constitute the Sixth pay Commission, let there be scams galore, at least the Government finances will remain healthy.