In an interview to comment on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s order to senior civil servants to prepare a roadmap for the first 100 days as well as for the first six months of the as yet unelected new government, former cabinet secretary K.M. Chandrasekhar has said this is “totally unconventional and unprecedented”. “I can’t remember any occasion on which I was told or any official was told to prepare a plan in anticipation of a person coming back to power,” he added. Chandrasekhar said this was “not desirable, not right, not in the spirit of democracy”.
Chandrasekhar, who was cabinet secretary from 2007 to 2011, said, “Once an election is announced the role and character of a government certainly changes.” Explaining his point further, he said: “I think democracy demands that when an election is announced thereafter it’s only a holding operation the government performs.”
Chandrasekhar said he can’t think of any precedent, either in India or abroad, where the outgoing government has asked civil servants to prepare a roadmap for an unelected future government on the assumption that the outgoing government will be re-elected. He was asked whether this order from the prime minister, along with an earlier order last year asking joint secretary and junior officers to act as ‘Rath Prabharis’ and showcase the achievements of the last nine years, was “improper and a misuse of government powers”. Chandrasekhar twice said: “I absolutely agree”. He also agreed that the prime minister was guilty of “an impropriety”.
