Job security, political neutrality and anonymity
The significance of job security or permanency lies in the development of expertise and the natural growth of civil service ethos. Most importantly, security ensures the availability of such expertise to governments of differing political persuasions. The services owe their loyalty to the government of the day, irrespective of the political party and it is imperative that the services avoid creating the impression of political bias. The anonymity and political neutrality of public servants are usually reinforced by rules restricting political activity. This is so because if the public service is to serve governments of all political persuasions, it is essential that public servants or civil servants, whatever their private political views, must not be seen to be politically active in a manner which would inevitably compromise their neutrality under one political party or another.

If civil servants by their activities turn into public figures thereby subjecting them to scrutiny in media and parliament, their capacity for maintaining the appearance of political impartiality get badly damaged. The public servants are duty bound to give honest and impartial advice to ministers and to endeavour to deal with the affairs of the public sympathetically, effectively, promptly and without bias or maladministration of public money. They are also required to conduct themselves in such a manner as to deserve and retain the confidence of ministers and to be able to establish the same relationship with those whom they may be required to serve in some future administration. They must not misuse their official position to further their own or another's personal interests.

Post-liberation scenario and conditions of service
The constitution, under article 136, provides for the reorganisation of services of the Republic by an act of parliament. Under the relevant law of reorganisation, any condition of service of a person employed in the service of the Republic may be varied or revoked. The law, the Services Reorganisation Act, 1975, contains provisions empowering the government to vary the terms and conditions of service of a public servant even to his disadvantage. This was without doubt, a significant departure from the government of India Act, 1935, which laid down that the terms and conditions of the service of a civil servant could not be varied to his disadvantage.

The above act of 1935 contained a fair and salutary principle that aimed at protecting the interest of the members of the civil service so that they could act impartially without having to depend on the whims of the political executive. However, it is interesting to note that in respect of the offices held by the higher judiciary, the office of Comptroller and Auditor General, Election Commissioners and members of Public Service Commission, such variation to the disadvantage of the holder of the post does not exist. In fact article 147 of the constitution states that the remuneration, privileges and terms and conditions of service of a person holding or acting in any office mentioned under the same article shall not be varied to the disadvantage of any person during his term of office. So it follows that the aforementioned two different sets of dispensations is discriminatory and the discrimination remains till date.

In the formative years of independent Bangladesh, the prominent political leaders had displayed high degree of distrust for the bureaucracy. That distrust influenced the new leaders to vitiate standing convention of political non-interference in recruitment and routine civil service management. The intention was to achieve dominance over bureaucracy in a changed socio-political environment. The government, however, constituted the Administrative and Services Reorganisation Committee. This committee showed the way for the reform but their recommendation for reorganisation remained in cold storage. This, therefore, indicated that the political leadership was not interested in a well organised administrative system. The bureaucracy itself was partially responsible for resisting reforms.

Schism, servility and marginalisation
Political expediencies have dominated the decision-making process in respect of recruitment to the civil service and subordinate ranks of police organisation. The quota system in recruitment to various services and posts has adversely affected the competitive ability of many well qualified candidates. Successive political governments have refrained from effective changes in the quota system for fear of losing popularity. The priority of merit over so-called equitable principles does not merit discussion in the policy parlance.

In 1972 separate examinations were held for freedom fighters and non-freedom fighters. Candidates in the freedom fighter category were recruited only through interview and the special dispensation to the freedom fighters was based solely on political rather than administrative considerations. In the process, the civil service lost its homogeneous character which is considered necessary for morale of the service and the espirit de corps. This had its undesirable impact on a politically neutral civil service.

In 1976 and 1978 deliberately motivated lateral appointments were made in police and some other services. The appointees were ex-armed forces personnel. These appointees who were termed as beneficiaries of post August 1975 change over, caused lot of heartburn in the regular appointees and the services experienced a great degree of imbalance and uneasiness. As a result, several interest groups developed within the services, each with their own agenda. There were the regular appointees from former All-Pakistan Services, central services of Pakistan, East Pakistan civil service, freedom fighter appointees of 1973, the ex-defence services lateral appointees and post 1979 regular appointees.

The politicians exploited the above different interest groups who were ready to be abused and misused and had amongst their ranks some of the most shamefully pliable officials. These officials in the civil and non-civil bureaucracy had the dubious distinction of being the forerunner of media coup and election engineering. Quite a few of our academically brilliant bureaucrats became the henchmen of the vilest dictator. The political polarisation of the services started in the eighties. The 1973 appointees were suspected to be aligned to the Awami League while the lateral appointees were considered faithfuls for the BNP

The 'Janatar Mancha' of 1996 and the general election of 2001 brought into sharp focus the ugly fangs of polarisation in the service. Scores of officers were retired on alleged political allegiance to a particular political party while the faithfuls or partisans were given prize postings and accelerated promotions. The divisiveness became all too prominent and manifest.

The pernicious cronyism
Under circumstances as above, cronyism has assumed new heights. Cynics say that cronyism has now been almost institutionalised and it is an accepted practice that at a higher level, only the cronies get the plum jobs. In the recent past, ruling party functionaries including influential ministers have ensured large recruitments in police, education, election commission in utter disregard of all rules or regulations. Members of Parliament and other ruling party influentials were allegedly allocated their own quotas for jobs.

The above-mentioned cronyism brings with it the problems of delinquency, incompetence and, of course, pliability. In addition, a clique of corrupt courtiers always surround those who wield power in a medieval ruling culture. They become the link between the rulers and the ruled.

The above practices give rise to arbitrariness and irrationality. As against institutional development, we have now developed a patron-client relationship. A whole network of patronage has been built around quotas for jobs, admissions, urban plots, connections for electricity, gas or telephone and dispensation of development funds. The distinction between public property and private gain is totally blurred. Another ominous development is the contempt for rule of law. There is establishment happiness with people who are pliable and corrupt but claim to produce 'results'.

The desired course
We seem to have forgotten that the foundation of a state rests upon the impartiality and resilience of some institutions, prominent among which is the public service or civil service, whatever name you call it. Bureaucracy is a necessary organisation for carrying out public functions while bureaucratic vices are condemnable, one has to appreciate that. The partisan behaviour and attitude of the government and the perilous polarisation of our society are marginalising the public services. Let us not forget that the public sector still remains a major actor in the nation-building process and this highlights the necessity of politically neutral merit-based public service. We have to realise that it is not conducive for a strong and mature political government to have a bureaucracy about whose quality the recruitment agency and the society at large entertain grave doubts. The premonition is that our present conditions, if not amended, may lead to a stateless society. In a stateless society the constitutional government will be dislodged by political brats and their god fathers.

Muhammad Nurul Huda is a former Secretary and IGP