Mr Raghav
Chandra IAS 1982, Madya Pradesh Cadre, spoke to ‘The Indian Civil Servant’
about his experiences in a long career in Civil Services: The excerpts:
(January 2020)
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
Q: What inspired you
to join civil services? Was it in the family?
RAGHAV CHANDRA: Yes. My father was
in the State Government Service in UP. He had worked with the various ICS and
senior IAS officers. His life’s dream was to see me in the IAS. Therefore the
level of family indoctrination was very strong that I should get into the IAS and
make it. Both my parents from time to time, used to express their desire that I
should make it. I was studying in La Martiniere school in Lucknow at that time.
Afterwards, I came to St. Stephens College Delhi in 1975. One of the reasons why
I choose to do mathematics honors was that I should score good marks in the IAS
examination. I continued to do my M.Sc in Maths and at one stage I wanted to go
abroad do PhD in Maths and I got fascinated by the subject. But the
indoctrination for civil services was so strong that I was practically,
emotionally and psychologically forced to appear for the Civil Services exam.
It’s my destiny and chance that I did make it and I did succeed in getting into
the IAS in 1982 batch and I got the Madhya Pradesh Cadre. My first choice was
Uttar Pradesh and also wanted to join the Foreign Service. But finally I got
Madhya Pradesh.
Although decisions like this are not entirely based on
what your parents want you to do. Ultimately after all I spent 5 years in
college and I was mature enough to form my own expectations, my own
understanding of the civil service and I thought it was the great opportunity
to do service for the society as a whole, to be able to change India, to be
able to change the things it works. There were times with which one was not
comfortable with. If you remember that was the time when emergency had been
evoked so there was a lot of enthusiasm among the students like me about how
the nation should really function and it should truly be a democratic and open
inclusive society. There was also this thing about ensuring that there was
justice to the weaker section of society and one was having being brought up in
a very liberal, tolerant, inclusive environment such as in Delhi so I was very
keen to actually get into the service myself too, essentially to be able to
improve the lot of people as a whole and I must say that at the end of the day
I am reasonably satisfied with the journey. At the end of the day, well that is
how it is and I have completed my full innings of 36 years in the service and
occupied all important positions in State
and Govt of India.
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
Q: Tell us about your
journey in the IAS. Any interesting anecdotes?
RAGHAV CHANDRA: The journey has been one long journey. Literally
I started of with Satna in Madhya Pradesh then I went to Ashok Nagar in Guna in
a different division. I have been to different corners like I have been posted
in Korba which is today in Chattisgarh but at that time it was intrinsic part
of Madhya Pradesh and having being posted in a Tribal area like Korba one
travelled to absolutely way out places like Leh Maru which people said is
actually “LeMaru” and it was a remote
tribal area Syang to Pondioprora to Sarguja to Jashpur Nagar. These are the
places pretty far out and which people don’t normally go to Bastar and then I
got transferred as a Collector to an absolutely dramatically opposite part of
the state that is Khandava. So when I travelled by car on transfer it took me
two days having made various stops in there to reach Khandava. You can imagine
the geographical distance that states like undivided Madhya Pradesh had and in
the course of service one does have to travel not only within one state but
abroad also. I got to travel for various trainings to the US, to Europe, to
Australia and to various other places which in the normal course a person would
not get to travel. So to that extent you rise in Civil Service and navigate a
tremendous journey its but more than an physical journey it’s also a journey of
ideas, of thoughts, of experiences, of meeting different people. A very wide
range of people one bumps into from film stars to sports people to politicians
to writers and to other extreme the poor, the deprived, the disadvantaged and
the people who actually represent the lowest starta of society and for whom
there is a tremendous amount one can devote and aspire to mitigate their
grievances.
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
I
must say that in civil service, you get
to meet such a wide variety of people. For instance when I was posted in
Khandava and I must mention that in Khandava which is famous for legendary
singer like Kishore Kumar and Kishore Kumar used to call himself as ‘Khandavawala’.
Unfortunately, I arrived on the scene just after Kishore Kumar had expired and
his body has been cremated in Khandava as per his wishes. There was a
tremendous amount of a love and affection for him in public. It so happened
that on one day while inspecting the city I came across a beautiful old cottage
in the heart of the city in the road called Bombay Bazaar because of Khandava’s
historical association with Bombay. And wow there was this house which belongs
to a Ganguly Parivaar and that was Kishore Kumar’s house. He used to live in there.
It has a four bedrooms and various little little artifacts. So I decided to
build a Kishore Kumar music Museum and it would have been the country’s first
musical museum. On my invite Anoop Kumar came over, Leena Chandervarkar came
over, Sumit Kumar and Amit Kumar came
over and we organized “Zindagi ka Safar” music competition and invited entries
from all over the country. It turned out to be a big show.
Q: Would you agree that ethical standards are
declining among young officers. What
can be done to remedy the situation?
RAGHAV
CHANDRA: Ethics
is a set of standards that society adopts for itself and which help guide
behavior, choices and actions. Also how do we conduct ourselves in personal
life or public life? It is sense of right and wrong about our culture and
civilization. For example the code of ethical conduct for civil servants
demands allegiance to constitution, maintain highest ethical standards.
Maintain integrity, absolute devotion to duty, not indulging in any conduct
which is unbecoming of Government servant; avoid conflict of interest and
apolitical functioning etc. In my considered opinion all civil servants should
follow the ethical path through out their career. I have great hope from coming
generations. And I do not believe that ethical standards are on the decline.
However, perception to look into and respond to conflicting situations may have
undergone a change.
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
RAGHAV CHANDRA: When I was posted in Bhopal and that was the
year when practically a tiger was getting killed in some part of the country every
day. That was the time when Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh Sahab ordered CBI
enquiry regarding disappearance of the Tigers from Sariska Tiger Reserve in
Rajasthan. There was also a whole furrow about disappearance of Tigers from
Panna National Tiger Park in MP. Then I began to research the subject. I spoke
to dozens of forest officers; I interviewed people around all over the forest
department and met many other people who were connected with the forest. I came
to the conclusion that this was the subject which needed to be brought up to
the people as a story, as a narrative about how India’s wildlife has depleted
through the ages, about how it had become a passion for the British to shoot
wildlife. The kind of denudation and degradation brought to our jungles and
therefore I captured it through my book “Scent of a Game” published by RUPA and
which talks about the entire history of wildlife Shikari India, The Maharajas
and even modern day poaching and what happens to the international trade to the
endangered species and it was well received and I am glad to say that this is a
subject that has generated a lot of interest. The most gratifying moment in
this was when recently I was invited to the Prime Minister’s house as one of
the selected invitees when the “Tiger Survey Report” for 2019 was released and
it is very heartening to note that Tiger population has once again started
growing and has become reasonably significant.
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
Q: You have also
authored another book on dalit issues in Indian bureaucracy. Can you tell us
more about it?
RAGHAV CHANDRA: It’s a fiction revolving around a dalit girl
who despite all odds joins Indian Foreign Service (IFS). The story in short
goes like this. On a chilly November
morning in Geneva, Deepika prepares to address the United Nations Human Rights Council.
Despite her personal experience of oppression as a dalit woman, she must claim
that the Indian Government remains firmly committed to eradicating caste-based
discrimination in the country. As echoes of humiliation and atrocities flood
her memory, Deepika is transported back in time, to almost six years ago, when
she became the first member of her family to be selected for the Indian Civil
Services. She had moved from Bhopal, her home town, to the Lal Bahadur Shastri
National Academy of Administration in Mussoorie, to start a career as an IFS
officer. It was here that she met Aman, an upper-caste Brahmin, and Vijay, a
fellow dalit. Both relationships defined by caste and class politics, Deepika
had found her in the crosshairs of an ancient history built on inequality and
prejudice. Yet, as a diplomat from Indian Foreign Service, she must deny caste,
and the fact that India's fractured society, despite its apparent modernization
and progress, remains stuck in the middle ages. Her father's words come back to
haunt her: ‘When you cannot fight the system, you must endure. ‘will Deepika
fight? Will she endure? What will she say to the Human Rights Council? How will
she represent India to the rest of the world? This is all you will find in my
book published by MACMILIAN.
Q: Hundreds of young
boys and girls aspire to join civil services every year. What message would you like to convey to them?
RAGHAV CHANDRA: I would say that Civil Services still offers
a very very exciting career, vide variety, lot of intense dealing with issues
and you have the opportunity to do everything that you want to in terms of
delivering on the grounds. I think there is a great opportunity for people who
are stable in their minds, people who are not flashy, people who are not
looking for becoming billionaires but who want to lead a comfortable and satisfactory
life which is socially responsible and where they want to serve humanity. The
essence for all those who wants to enter the Civil Services should be that you
are entering into a service basically for fulfilling yourself as a person who
serves people and not as somebody who wants to serve a particular mandate to
earn money, to become rich, to lead a flashy life style and to be ostentatious.
Given a choice I would once again be a Civil Servant because whatever I am
today is because of the Civil Service as it’s given me the platform to really
enquire explore and achieve what was good and what was the best for me. Post
retirement here is a lot to do even now and whatever I may achieve even now
would thankfully be attributed to my long association with the Civil Services.
Click below for video link on Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtG6URrpyvU
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