Three days after the Union Public Service Commission advertised 45 posts for lateral entry as joint secretaries, directors and deputy secretaries, the government moved swiftly to cancel the advertisement before it could snowball into a political issue ahead of assembly polls. Prime Minister Narendra Modi took ownership of the decision to cancel the process with a message to incorporate reservation and address issue of social justice.
“We will study the entire system to see how reservations are introduced into the selection process. As the PM is sensitive to the idea of social justice, the scheme of lateral entry will be reworked. No one has spoken against the merits of the scheme of inducting specialists into administration,” a highly placed source said.
The government has not given any time frame for bringing the reworked scheme, but it may take several months as the issue of reservation is incorporated into the selection process.
Explained: Why did Modi govt backtrack from lateral entry move?
At present, 57 officers hired as lateral entry to the post of joint secretary are currently working in the various departments of the government. The scheme was first launched in 2018 and since then 63 posts were filled in three separate hirings. This was supposed to be the fourth selection and the largest process through the UPSC.
There was a backlog as posts could not be advertised because of code of conduct and had thus piled up. This time, the plan was to bring domain experts and specialists even at the level of directors and deputy secretaries as they are the ones taking decisions, an official said. Among the posts advertised were for subjects like artificial intelligence, nutrition, fintech, semiconductors. These posts were to be filled in 24 ministries.
The issue had heated up in 2018 when the government first introduced lateral entry when 10 joint secretaries were hired. During a discussion in the parliament, union minister Jitendra Singh who held the charge of DOPT told the House that it was not supplementation in the civil services rather than replacement.
The government claimed to have introduced a section process through the UPSC to hire specialists rather than making the decision based on recommendations, the government sources said citing example of technocrats hired during the UPA time when no selection process existed. They cite the examples of even Manmohan Singh who became finance secretary, apart from Montek Singh, Sam Pitroda among others.
Among the technical problems which will need to be worked out before reservation can be applied to the selection process, the officials said the lateral entry posts are for three years with a provision for extension of two years. As these were not recurring posts, with shorter duration, the reservation policy may need revisiting and finding a solution. “Notwithstanding these issues, we will study them to find a solution,” highly placed source added.
Politically, the government has done ‘course correction’ before the issue of social justice, reservation and dalits could come to bite it again as it has done in the last Lok Sabha polls. It is unlike the 2020 farmers issue when the government continued to stall their demands of recalling the three farm bills till it felt that political costs were higher. At that time, the bills were withdrawn after 11 months of protests. This time it has acted earlier fearing that it could cause anger among the youth who were already miffed due to series of paper leaks.
Centre asks UPSC to cancel lateral entry advertisement amid widespread criticism
Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi had raised the issue that government was trying to bypass reservation through lateral entry.
Before the withdrawal of lateral entry process, the ministers and BJP had strongly defended the move. The NDA allies like Chirag Paswan whose core bank is dalits spoke against the selection process.
“The prime minister is of the firm belief that the process of lateral entry must be aligned with the principles of equity and social justice enshrined in our Constitution, particularly concerning the provisions of reservation,” Union minister Jitendra Singh wrote in his letter to the UPSC chairperson.
Information and broadcasting minister Ashwini Vaishnav said, PM Narendra Modi has once again reinstated Baba Saheb Bhimrao Ambedkar's commitment to the Constitution by taking a very important decision.
UPSC had adopted a very transparent method for lateral entry. We have taken such a decision to apply the principle of reservation in that too. Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has always shown his commitment towards social justice.”
