Chief Minister’s field visits evoke mixed response

CHENNAI: As Chief Minister MK Stalin has completed the second leg of the “Kala Aaivil Muthalamaichar” (Chief Minister on field inspection) initiative to review the progress of the government’s schemes, the jury is still out on its efficacy. While some former bureaucrats have welcomed it, others are of the view that there are more effective ways to monitor progress on the ground.

Welcoming Chief Minister Stalin’s decision to conduct on-ground inspection, retired IAS officer G Balachandran, who was the chief secretary of an eastern state, said the quality of the work and policy implementation would improve when the Chief Minister himself is undertaking the review.

“The Chief Minister has made it very clear that he does not hold reviews to blame. The Collectors will focus on deficiencies owing to the CM’s visit,” he said. However, it would not be possible for the Chief Minister to do this often, he said, suggesting that a retired officer of integrity, social consciousness and efficiency, preferably one who retired from the chief secretary rank, could be appointed to monitor the schemes.

“The person will report to the CM through the Chief Secretary [so that] there will not be any conflict between serving and the retired officers,” he added.

But, not all are convinced about the utility of the initiative. Many pointed out that the Chief Minister already holds Collectors’ conference once a year, which could be held twice a year if necessary. Preparations for such review meetings would consume a lot of time at the district-level. Though it was necessary for the Chief Minister to go on field visits once a while, he must not do the job of officials, they said.

Instead of using the government machinery effectively, the dislocation of senior officers for such initiatives without commensurate benefits was a sheer waste of time, said some of them.

A better system would be to have a monitoring cell, the officers said, adding that the officials, who are part of the cell, must be the eyes and ears of the Chief Minister.

“The bane of the government machinery is officials furnishing false figures during reviews. Be it the PM or CM or HoD level review, the lower level officials furnish false information about scheme implementation during reviews. Sifting through the data is itself a herculean task,” the officers opined.

At each leg of such field inspection, there are at least 60-70 schemes and programmes that would require review, which would not be feasible for the Chief Minister to do during short visits lasting a day or two.

Another aspect that experienced officials pointed out is the Collectors taking the Chief Minister or Chief Secretary only to places where the implementation is good, due to which the desired outcome of such reviews would be lost.

Also, the element of surprise would be lost during such scheduled reviews, the bureaucrats said, suggesting that there could be vigorous field verification instead to ensure prompt and proper implementation of government schemes and programmes.