Bureaucracy and Indian Mountains

On June 4, 2009, quoting a survey done by Hong Kong-based firm, Political & Economic Risk Consultancy (http://www.asiarisk.com/subscribe/dataindx.html), Indian newspapers  flashed a Reuters news item saying that Indian bureaucracy was least efficient among 12 Asian economies whereas those from Singapore topped the chart. The 12-page report based on a poll of 1,274 expatriates working in 12 Asian nations, went to an extent of terming India's bureaucracy "suffocating". It also said that working with the country's civil servants was a "slow and painful" process.

At first, like any proud Indian, I did not get carried away by this survey report. You see these Hongkong and Singapore guys living in their hyper sanitized world do not have a clue about the other factors that influence Indian Bureaucracy. You know politicians, intelligentsia etc. Surely we never are short of our very own spiced up logic and reasoning ( or should we say 'excuses'). Let me share my latest encounter with my own country's ' Babudome'.

I was in Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim this week. Going to the mountains and not climbing or hiking is not fun! But I was pursuing a paper work related to a very interesting mountaineering expedition in North Sikkim. It is part of my job as an expedition outfitter. After getting green signals from the Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Home Affairs and the Indian Mountaineering Foundation; it was the Sikkim state government clearance we needed. Indian Mountaineering Foundation, the central body for all mountaineering activity in the Indian Himalaya had already forwarded our Expedition files to all the concerned departments. Seemingly I only had to show up and pay the royalty money and get the clearance note.

But when I asked to whom ( to be specific to which department ) we should make the payment, confusion prevailed. What followed was a confused bouncing from Tourism to Home, Home to Forest department; and then Forest to Home again and finally to Forest. With the serious look in the each clerk and officer's face; I felt like getting close to some answers. But at the end of the trip there was still no definite answers! No one had a clue!

So the Sikkim Government has decided to charge 3 times additional royalty charges on peaks within it's territory ( on top of the royalty being paid to the IMF at Delhi); but do not have a clue who will collect the fee and how much. Trust me high officers sitting in their fancy chambers really made phone calls to each other only to find out no one knows the specific information.

So now that 'we' ( read 'our Government') have decided to make money out of the Himalayan summits; 'we' will figure out a way to squeeze out precious dollars from the climbers pocket and will make speeches at the end of the day " Mera Bharat Mahaan" ,  The bureaucrats at Delhi and Sikkim will meet time again and discuss the new fee structure. They will leave no stones unturned and will even fly to the corners of the planet ( by spending public money of course!) and import new and fantastic ideas back home.

Efficiency at work and quality of service can wait, another hundred years maybe, and we can always find a scape goat to put the blames on! "Jai Ho"
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