Beware of sycophants
The ruling party, members of parliament, political leaders and activists, and officers and employees of the administration are showering the ministers, state ministers and deputy ministers with praise and greetings. There is nothing wrong with congratulating the new ministers, state ministers and deputy ministers, as long as the greetings are not over extravagant. But in our culture, rhetoric overtakes action and there is more show than substance.
Those who today are so eager to lavish praise upon the new ministers, five years ago flooded their predecessors too with a deluge of praise. Such greetings and receptions have two objectives. One is simply to greet the ministers out of sincerity and as a matter of formality. The second is to please the minister so as to reap benefits from this in the future. Given the manner in which the ministers are being congratulated and accorded receptions all over the country, it is apparent that the latter motive is in the fore.
Advertisements are also being published in the newspapers, greeting the ministers, state ministers and deputy ministers. This is a golden opportunity not just to congratulate the concerned persons, but to also publicise the name and business of the person who is offering the greetings. There is also a matter of psychological pressure involved. When a private university congratulates the education minister or a private bank felicitates the finance minister in a newspaper advertisement, then other organisations of the same standing feel obliged to follow suit.
And this enthusiasm is not just restricted to private organisations. Over the past few years, government organisations too have been congratulating their respective ministers through newspaper advertisements. The minister doesn’t make any advance allocation to be praised after he places the budget in parliament. That means the advertisement that congratulates him for the budget has been paid for from some other fund. There is the risk unhealthy competition. For example, if there are 10 organisations under a certain ministry and one of them congratulates the minister through an advertisement, the others will feel obliged to do so too.
The responsibility of any government organisation is to implement government policy and programmes. If the organisation or its senior officials can do so in an efficient and effective manner, that would be the greatest gift for the minister. After taking over office, many ministers criticise the past disorder, corruption and irregularities of the ministry. It is assumed that they do so based on facts and figures. It is then their duty to take action against those for whom such irregularities and corruption took place.
Rather than be intoxicated and blinded by the flowery felicitations, the new ministers should minutely scrutinise past failures, irregularities and corruption and determine the way ahead. Unless measures are taken against those responsible for the failure of the predecessor, the successor is bound to face the same fate.
The new ministers have taken up office in the new government. It is hoped that they are not weighed down by the old culture of sycophancy.