For administrators

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES OF PUBLIC ADMINISTRATORS: Swami Ranganathananda; Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Kulapati Munshi Marg, Mumbai-400007. Rs. 40.

THE AUTHOR of the book under review has been lecturing to administrators for long, both in-service trainees and experienced administrators. In this talk, delivered shortly after the emergency in 1977, he pleads for better responsiveness on the part of administrators.

That bureaucracy-bashing was the favourite bee in everyone's bonnet then does not detract from the theme of his talk. For he has been consistent going by his earlier and later talks.

The Swamiji gently chides administrators for being callous and wooden. He does not set much store by mere intelligence and know- how. It does not serve public cause, unless accompanied by faith and conviction. He calls this ``sraddha'' and also a spiritual outlook and humanistic impulse.

Making a distinction between concrete sympathy and imaginative sympathy, he treats the first as normal human reflect when someone suffers within our sight. Most of us are moved to extend at least a token help. But what matters in the administrator is the sympathy for the faceless and voiceless citizen behind the labyrinth of files in government offices.

Swami Ranganathananda faults the officers for their excessive concern with the triple Ps - pay, prospects and promotion - as mere beings and functionaries. They should rise above these and act as citizens of India who would not allow any fellow human being to suffer injustice.

He commends the Budhiyoga of the Bhagavad Gita - a combination of manliness and saintliness - to all administrators. They should not flaunt their power and authority, but be Rajarishis, interested more in power with the people than power over them.

The author's diagnosis is faultless. But the bureaucrat is only one limb of the government machinery and unless the ruling politicians, legislators and judiciary share the same ideals, and work in concert, no betterment is possible. The Swamiji's prescriptions apply to all of them as well.

A.S. PADMANABHAN

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