Create a Nitipath for the civil service

At the heart of the Indian republic’s inability to deliver basic public services to its citizens is its chronic inability to address the shortfall in administrative capacity. In the past two decades, political leaders and policy analysts have chosen to side-step the complex problem of administrative reform and instead, used innovative methods like privatisation, public-private partnerships and technology to deliver public services. At the same time, philanthropy, corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have stepped in to provide a variety of public services — schooling, healthcare, nutrition, skill development and social security — that the state ought to have provided, but is unable to.