Not very diplomatic
For anybody looking to make the new ambassador to the US look foolish there could not be a better time to leak Abdul Basit’s letter to him. And for a diplomat whose skills in diplomacy led him to the sensitive assignment of India, the letter itself, or the intention of framing and sending it to begin with, was not very diplomatic, to say the least. Now, even if the letter was motivated by jealousy – as Aizaz Ch implied after saying, interestingly, that he would not reply – the ambassador in Washington will carry a question mark about his credentials at a time when the White House is the angriest since Clinton sanctioned us after the ’98 nuclear tests.
This is not the first sign of decay in the foreign service, even if it is one of the ugliest. Over time, it has become just another one of those parts of the government machinery that just runs on autopilot and provides little intrinsic value add. But the rot is now common among all civil services. One reason is that the finer minds no longer opt for the ‘competition exam’, and prefer greener pastures of the corporate world or, better yet, the outside world. Another is that the CSS structure has just not adapted with time. And mostly less educated hordes from the periphery, for no fault of their own, end up filling most government cadres. Few of them, owing to difference in standard of education, even fit in better paying sectors.
The need for civil service reforms becomes more urgent by the day. Yet government priorities in our country tend to revolve more around saving democracy, or the ruling family, etc, than the needs of the government structure or the needs of the common man. Till the right steps are taken, wrong things will continue to happen. Hopefully the foreign service will take more care and instill better diplomacy in some of its more prominent members.