The Naga Students’ Federation (NSF) has pointed out that the State Government’s blanket ban on the creation of posts has in fact given a great advantage to the influential politicians and high ranking government servants as every single post created by the government is at the whims and fancies of this ‘influential group of people’. Likewise, the NSF points out; the practice of backdoor appointments will be rampant and go on unabated. All these pointers are not only facts but also a matter of serious concern as this systemic monopoly of the few deprives equal opportunity and justice to many others thereby making a mockery of the welfare objective of the government. The demand therefore of the NSF calling upon the State government to unconditionally lift the blanket ban on creation of government jobs has some merit.
When the present government under the Chief Minister took steps towards fiscal re-correction, it was welcomed in these columns. The introduction of the Nagaland Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Bill 2005 by the Chief Minister was seen as a forward movement in expenditure reform, which Nagaland urgently required. The Chief Minister had likewise admitted on several occasions that the government was over burdened because of the overstaffing pattern of employees and had himself announced the three corrective measures—ban on creation of new posts, inter-departmental transfer of existing manpower, Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS)—in the context of expenditure reforms.
Other than piloting the Fiscal Responsibility Act through the Nagaland Legislative Assembly, the compulsion of politics has once again come in the way and in the process all the good talks have remained mostly on paper. It is obvious that in order to carry out any form of expenditure reform, it will require outmost sincerity of the political leadership and the first step towards this would be to cut down on wasteful spending and populist measures. And now with elections just around the corner, one will only expect that the initiative at expenditure reform will go into the backburner. In fact, the government has defied its own logic on austerity measures by bending backwards and selectively sanctioning new posts to accommodate the interests of a few with strong political backing. Such kind of political maneuvering sends out the wrong message especially to the younger generation that only by bending the rules of the game as opposed to fair-play can one emerge successful. Clearly political discretion has killed meritocracy in the State and the NSF as the highest student body for the Nagas should be a worried lot.
The NSF should continue to pressurize the government so as to ensure job recruitment through an open and transparent process. The government establishment should be reminded to make public job vacancies in the various State-run departments and putting forward the vacant posts for recruitment through the Nagaland Public Service Commission (NPSC). While recently, some departments have gone for a public recruitment process as formally requisitioned by the NPSC, others need to follow suit. This will put to rest both apprehension and genuine grievances of the public about illegal appointments to government jobs. It goes without saying that an open system of recruitment process will give an equal opportunity to the qualified and deserving youths waiting in the wings.
