Babus Rule The Roost: Another U-Turn of Kapil Sibal

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A former private secretary to Kapil Sibal is set to head India’s largest central government school chain less than a year after the human resource development minister objected to bureaucrats occupying top education posts.
The HRD ministry has recommended Avinash Dikshit, a 1986 batch officer of the Indian Defence Accounts Service, for the post of commissioner, Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan, lying vacant since October 31, top government officials told The Telegraph.

Dikshit was a private secretary to Sibal between 2004 and 2006 when the Congress leader was the minister for science and technology in the first UPA government.

The HRD ministry has asked the appointments committee of the cabinet headed by the Prime Minister to approve Dikhsit’s nomination. The committee is the apex panel for top government appointments and is likely to clear Dikshit’s name soon, sources said.

The Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan runs over 1,000 schools across the country and in a few foreign countries. Over a million students study in the Kendriya Vidyalayas.

Dikshit’s name was recommended by the ministry after a search-cum-selection panel set up by Sibal found him most appropriate for the post.

No one, including other contenders for the post, is known to have either formally voiced criticism of the manner in which the selection was conducted or questioned Dikshit’s record as an official.

But Sibal’s stamp of approval for the appointment of his own former aide suggests that he has backtracked on a stand he had taken last year.

Last year, Sibal had indicated to his officials that he did not want a career bureaucrat or police officer to head any educational body.

Academicians across the country had for several years criticised the government’s education appointments policy, blaming it for the increased bureaucratisation and politicisation of education.

A bureaucrat or policeman, dependent on his political masters for career promotions is unlikely to challenge politicians on matters of academic autonomy, these academicians had argued.

In official file notings, Sibal had questioned the practice of appointing officials removed from education to top posts at academic bodies or institutions — a practice common under his predecessors Arjun Singh and Murli Manohar Joshi.

Sibal’s comments to his officials appeared to finally indicate a shift towards academicians governing educational institutions and bodies.

But the ministry’s decision to pick Dikshit suggests that the minister has decided to abandon his opposition to the appointment of career bureaucrats to top education posts.