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New Delhi, November 23 (IANS) The democratic system is the best form of governance because it promotes transparency, which makes it possible to fix accountability. Accountability is essential to run a corruption free system which mainly depended on correct decisions and transparency helped in checking the decision making process.
The execution of a decision may be hampered due to incompetence, negligence or corruption and here too, transparency of procedures including adherence to timelines and rules may prove to be very important. Furthermore, performance at any level involves effective supervision – the role of supervisors is often not scrutinized – and transparency was needed to make it possible to even examine this aspect of organizational functioning. If their performance is not scrutinized from outside, anti-corruption institutions themselves fail to act as deterrents.
The Vohra Committee report in 1993 called for an independent high-powered monitoring body outside the political executive due to the growing perception of political-bureaucratic nexus. The reports of several Administrative Reform Commissions (ARCs) on delegation of decision making, limiting the number of levels a file passes through to reach a final decision and the creation of inter-disciplinary teams to address cross-cutting issues in a transparent manner were not implemented. It is to the credit of the Modi regime that inter-ministerial coordination has improved significantly and any matter is placed before the Cabinet as per the time limit.
There is an inherent contradiction between privacy and transparency and privacy must be embraced within the rules that legitimize it. The RTI Act 2005 deals with this matter and strikes a balance between transparency and privacy in the interest of the nation, society and the individual. There is a provision in the Act which states that irrespective of any exemptions allowed in the Official Secrets Act or the RTI Act, a public authority may allow access to information if ‘the public interest in disclosure outweighs the harm it would cause to protected interests.’
The exemptions from disclosure granted by OSA in 1967 in the RTI Act also apply as they relate to matters relating to the ‘sovereignty and integrity of India’, security of the state or friendly relations with other countries. Maintaining confidentiality of information requires ‘security classification’ which in turn defines ‘restrictive security’ or ‘need to know’ parameters for accessing it. It may be mentioned that work that involves handling secret information requires a certain amount of mental strength and is not for those who were trustworthy, who lacked self-discipline or who did not have the ability to differentiate between official opinion and gossip. All this highlights the strategic importance of transparency in the context of governance of a democratic state.
This is the era of proxy wars and one way to harm a target country without resorting to ‘open’ war is to attack its economic strength and assets. Bill Clinton’s Secretary of State Warren Christopher famously said in 1993 that ‘national security is inseparable from economic security.’ Pak ISI chose Mumbai for 26/11 attack because it is the financial capital of India. Therefore, it follows that any enterprise that provides economic strength to the country must have a group of professionally trained people to protect its security and handle what is called ‘insider threat management’.
The latter is one that brings together the functions of vigilance and security because a corrupt employee can easily fall into the trap of enemy designs. Both of these functions now have to be integrated with key management because the source of ‘insider threat’ can lie dormant in any part of the enterprise, making it incumbent upon the vigilance and security practitioner to have complete knowledge of how the organization was run and how its operations were conducted. This validates the principle that security and vigilance should derive their authority from the person at the top. These functions depended for their success on the ability and accessibility of the operators, who were required to convince senior mainstream supervisors that the latter would act as ‘eyes and ears’ for the former in various areas of the enterprise.
The work of vigilance and security begins by looking for members who appear to be ‘vulnerable’ to the influence of the opponent. Insecurity is universally attributed to ‘significant addiction’, ‘greed’ and ‘dissatisfaction’. Security and vigilance personnel trained in intelligence trade crafts such as surveillance and covert interrogation can investigate such persons and also advise them against their ‘weaknesses’ in appropriate cases.
The growing importance of these functions is reflected in new areas where security officers may be called upon to lend a helping hand. Background checks, re-verification of antecedents of people handling ‘sensitive’ tasks and even ‘due diligence’ tasks may fall to them. They may be required to conduct recruitment interviews, prepare the do’s and don’ts of the organization, and help in building the information security system of the enterprise.
They would pay special attention to this last mentioned function in view of the fact that there was the possibility of a dislocated insider making unauthorized communications with an external entity. Above all, the vigilance and security system should play the role of a guardian by organizing formal or informal programs to promote an organizational culture of ethics, integrity and honesty of purpose which should drive the execution of tasks assigned to the members of the organisation.
Transparency in governance has emerged as a new challenge before the people because on one hand the tendency of political rulers to hide their shortcomings and their reluctance to punish corrupt insiders and on the other hand the opposition’s social media campaign to topple governance through ‘influence war’.
India’s universal adult franchise is a model for democracy, but the prevalence of caste, creed and regional divisions against the backdrop of poverty and limited education encouraged all parties to resort to undemocratic means to win elections. Indian voters have proven their democratic credentials and have retained their faith in nationalism and peace even in the face of personal economic problems.
India has to rely especially on its youth and its women power to evaluate rulers on merit. The Modi government’s foreign and domestic policies based on mutually beneficial bilateral relations without aligning India with any world power, promoting infrastructure for the benefit of all Indians as well as encouraging digital connectivity for economic empowerment of the youth, are the hallmarks of this regime and have served the democratic state well. A conscientious judiciary, a strong social media and a constructive opposition are symbols of a transparent and viable democracy and citizens of India can take satisfaction from the fact that they all existed in India.
(The author is a former director of the Intelligence Bureau)
–IANS
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