The Cabinet Secretary is the senior-most civil servant of the country who heads the cabinet secretariat. He is the principal adviser to the Prime Minister and his office combines an articulate interaction of politics and administration at the top echelons of the Union government.
He is not the chief secretary of the Union government but has an enormous amount of semblance with the chief secretary of the state government. The debate about his bureaucratic position and functioning has political overtones. He has emerged as a very powerful executive working as the pivot of the cabinet system. He is the head of civil service and an advisor, who can be called the conscience keeper to all the officials.
As an administrative leader of bureaucracy he commands the confidence of the Prime Minister and his cabinet colleagues. As a respectable official, he heads ‘the private department of the Prime Minister’. Naturally, there exists a great overlap of functions between the activities of the PM’s office and the Cabinet Secretary’s secretariat. He works as secretary to the head of the cabinet, i.e., Prime Minister, who alter ego he represents. The PM highly values mature advise of this experienced and venerable civil servant. It is a spring board to several key appointments which speaks volumes about its status and criticality.
Unlike his British counterpart the Cabinet Secretary in India has a shorter tenure. His senior- most position renders him an occupant for few months or years because of the army of juniors. The average tenure in UK has been about ten years. There have been only four cabinet secretaries in Britain, over a span of fifty years since Maurice Hankey was appointed in 1916; the fifth one took over in September 1973. Hankey himself served as Cabinet Secretary for twenty-two years while in India, there have been nine cabinet secretaries in twenty-five years, an average of well under three years.
The evolution of the office of CS has followed the ups and downs of his secretariat which the leadership styles of Indian Prime Ministers has influenced decisively. The history has provided the base but the Secretary of the Executive Council of the Governor-General could not settled down the model. As early as 1935, M.N. Malhotra put up a note about his recruitment position role but the government observed an evasive silence.
The main qualifications insisted upon were an intimate knowledge of the systems of cabinet government and a personality which will make for the smooth working of the new procedure. Another time when a debate took place about the position of E.G. Melville as Cabinet Secretary, a fear was expressed that the Cabinet Secretary would be a kind of super-secretary.
The Government repudiated the criticism up till 1950, the Cabinet Secretary was of the joint secretary’s rank. The Ayyangar Committee examined his position vis-vis his colleagues and recommended “He should be an administrative officer of the highest rank … and he should be entrusted, as head of the cabinet secretariat, with the positive function of securing coordination as well as timely and effective action by all departments of the Government of India in all matters in which the cabinet as a whole or the Prime Minister is interested …. While not laying on the Cabinet Secretary any specific functions which would impair the initiative and responsibility of heads of departments, I think it would be desirable to establish the convention that he should be the ex-officio president of the committee of secretaries set up to advise the Prime Minister and other ministers on selection for administrative appointments.”
The report made a plea for conventions and further recommended that he should be an ex officio president or the committee of secretaries set up to advise the Prime Ministers and other ministers on selections for administrative appointments. His status in the service should be such as to entitle him to be regarded as the first member of the public services and one is whose judgement and impartiality the government, as well as the services, could rely implicitly.
The Ayyangar recommendation was accepted and since 1950 the Cabinet Secretary has been the senior-most civil servant of the land. The Administrative Reforms Commission (1966-70), fixed his term for three years so that the functionary may provide effective leadership to the civil service.
Accordingly, the principal functions assigned to the Cabinet Secretary today are to serve as:
(a) The link between the Prime Minister’s office and various administrative ministries.
(b) The principal adviser to the Prime Minister.
(c) The link between the political system and the civil services of the country.
(d) The head of the cabinet secretariat, providing an umbrella organisation for various news agencies which cannot be located in any particular ministry or department.
(e) The head of the civil service – its conscience keeper.
(f) The principal adviser to the cabinet and the cabinet committees.
(g) A monitor and coordinator of activities of various ministries and departments.
The Deshmukh Study Team of the ARC and later the ARC report on the machinery of government eloquently pleaded for the empowerment of this office. The Deshmukh Study Team opined that “none of the tenure provisions … should stand in the way of a deserving person becoming Cabinet Secretary”. The Cabinet Secretary should be selected from amongst outstanding secretaries who have at least two years to go for normal superannuation, without seniority coming into the picture.
On selection, he should be appointed for a four-year term. If this takes him beyond the date of his normal superannuation, his service should be deemed as automatically extended. If not, he should compulsorily retire strictly at the close of his four-year term. The ARC report supported the suggestions and in commissions’ judgement the Cabinet Secretary should stay in his job for a period of three to four years.
In order to bring out the pre-eminent position of the Cabinet Secretary vis-a-vis other secretaries to government, the Deshmukh Study Team suggested that he be given a higher salary. The Administrative Reforms Commission, however, thought that “it was likely to affect the present cordial feeling among his colleagues that he is one of them” and did not agree to the Team’s recommendation.
To facilitate senior management at apex level the chief of the cabinet secretariat should not be handicapped. He should manage his house with competence. His role and relevance vis-a-vis his juniors and senior political functionaries can be effective if his position is improved by taking the following measures.
(1) The Cabinet Secretary should meet other secretaries periodically by rotation.
(2) The position of the Cabinet Secretary should be recognized in the Government of India Transaction of Business Rules.
(3) The Cabinet Secretary should be given a salary which puts him in a pre-eminent position vis-a-vis other secretaries.
(4) Cases involving differences of opinion between two or more ministers should be reported by the secretary concerned to the Cabinet Secretary, who should decide the question after obtaining the orders of the Prime Minister.
The Administrative Reforms Commission recognized that the Cabinet Secretary is the principal staff adviser of the Prime Minister, the cabinet and the cabinet committees. Hence, the advice should be tendered by him at his own level. This implies that the role of the Cabinet Secretary in policy matters should be restricted to cases with which he can deal personally.
The Cabinet Secretary provides the eyes and ears for the Prime Minister to keep in touch with the process of official business in the Central government. But he is not a watchdog or an invigilator on behalf of the Prime Minister. The Cabinet Secretary is a staff and he has no line functions in relation to the ministries. His role is to help, not to oversee. He acts on his own authority and responsibility.
He may be called upon to serve on occasions as a sort of general multipurpose official. His influence must inevitably grow with the passing of time during which he is seen to work m close proximity to the Prime Minister. But then he is a transient officials, of short duration. The CS deals with cabinet affairs and keeps contact with the ministers. He remains in touch with the secretaries in charge of the different ministries.
He keeps his vigilant eye on the smooth working of the system of communication and consultation of the Central government but is not expected to control or supervise it. The Cabinet Secretary, has no administrative authority to interfere but being the senior-most civil servant, he is looked up to offer leadership guidance and consultation to the entire system.
His relationship with public servants, makes him a guardian of all the permanent officials. He resolves interdepartmental difficulties. He ensures the high morale of the civil servants and protects the interests of civil servants vis-a-vis political leaders. The personality of the Cabinet Secretary is reflected in his role as a visionary leader and a motivator.
The Cabinet Secretary prepares the minutes of the decisions of the cabinet. He maintains secrecy and the differences of opinion among ministers are kept secret. The Cabinet Secretary ensures a proper implementation of the decisions and contacts the ministry concerned to ask what they have done about a certain matter. The PM is in direct charge of the cabinet secretariat and the Cabinet Secretary being responsible to him plays a variety of roles.
The Cabinet Secretary advises the PM on matters such as the classification of subjects, their grouping into suitable portfolios, allocation of particular portfolios amongst the ministers or transferring a subject or a department from one ministry to another. While tendering this advice he may consult other secretaries or the Committee of Secretaries on Administration which he heads to advises the PM. He also acts as the chairman of the Chief Secretaries’ committee and provides stability and continuity to government.
He advises and assists the President, the caretaker PM and the new PM and his cabinet as per provisions of the Constitution. The law prescribes that the sanction of the Cabinet Secretary needs to be obtained before the prosecution can be launched. Several judicial rulings agree with the personal judgements of the Cabinet Secretary. He may consult the legal experts in the government or some senior ministers or the Prime Minister but no appeal can be made against his decisions.