Ethics in Governance: Summary | Indian Polity for UPSC CSE PDF Download

Summary of Recommendations of ARC on Ethics in Governance

1. Ethics and politics- Political Funding
   • A system for partial state funding should be introduced in order to reduce the scope of illegitimate and unnecessary funding of expenditure for elections.
2. Tightening of Anti-Defection Law
   • The issue of disqualification of members on grounds of defection should be decided by the President/Governor on the advice of the Election Commission.
3. Disqualification
   • Section 8 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 needs to be amended to disqualify all persons facing charges related to grave and heinous offences and corruption, with the modification suggested by the Election Commission.
4. Coalition and Ethics
   • The Constitution should be amended to ensure that if one or more parties in a coalition with a common programme mandated by the electorate either explicitly before the elections or implicitly while forming the government, realign midstream with one or more parties outside the coalition, then Members of that party or parties shall have to seek a fresh mandate from the electorate.
5. Appointment of the Chief Election Commissioner
   • A collegium headed by the Prime Minister with the Speaker of the Lok Sabha, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, the Law Minister and the Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha as members should make recommendations for the consideration of the President for appointment of the Chief Election Commissioner and the Election Commissioners.
6. Expediting Disposal of Election Petitions
   • Special Election Tribunals should be constituted at the regional level under Article 323B of the Constitution to ensure speedy disposal of election petitions and disputes within a stipulated period of six months.
   • Each Tribunal should comprise a High Court Judge and a senior civil servant with at least 5 years of experience in the conduct of elections (not below the rank of an Additional Secretary to Government of India/Principal Secretary of a State Government).
   • Its mandate should be to ensure that all election petitions are decided within a period of six months as provided by law. The Tribunals should normally be set up for a term of one year only, extendable for a period of 6 months in exceptional circumstances.
7. Grounds of Disqualification for Membership
   • Appropriate legislation may be enacted under Article 102(e) of the Constitution spelling out the conditions for disqualification of membership of Parliament in an exhaustive manner. Similarly, the States may also legislate under Article 198 (e).
8. Ethical framework for Ministers in India
   • In addition to the existing Code of Conduct for Ministers, there should be a Code of Ethics to provide guidance on how Ministers should uphold the highest standards of constitutional and ethical conduct in the performance of their duties.
   • Dedicated units should be set up in the offices of the Prime Minister and the Chief Ministers to monitor the observance of the Code of Ethics and the Code of Conduct. The unit should also be empowered to receive public complaints regarding violation of the Code of Conduct.
   • An annual report with regard to the observance of these Codes should be submitted to the appropriate legislature.
   • The Code of Ethics should inter alia include broad principles of the Minister-civil servant relationship and the Code of Conduct.
   • The Code of Ethics, the Code of Conduct and the annual report should be put in the public domain.
9. Ethical Framework for Legislators
   • An Office of ‘Ethics Commissioner’ may be constituted by each House of Parliament. This Office, functioning under the Speaker/Chairman, would assist the Committee on Ethics in the discharge of its functions, and advise Members, when required, and maintain necessary records.
10. Code of Ethics for Civil Servants;
    • Conflict of interest should be comprehensively covered in the Code of Ethics and in the Code of Conduct for officers. Also, serving officials should not be nominated on the Boards of Public undertakings. This will, however, not apply to non-profit public institutions and advisory bodies.
11. Legal Framework for Fighting Corruption
    The following should be classified as offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act:
    • Gross perversion of the Constitution and democratic institutions amounting to wilful violation of oath of office.
    • Abuse of authority unduly favoring or harming someone.
    • Obstruction of justice.
    • Squandering public money.
    • Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act needs to be amended to provide for a special offence of ‘collusive bribery’. An offence could be classified as ‘collusive bribery’ if the outcome or intended outcome of the transaction leads to a loss to the state, public or public interest.
      The punishments for all such cases of collusive bribery should be double that of other cases of bribery. The law may be suitably amended in this regard.
12. Liability of Corrupt Public Servants to Pay Damage
    • In addition to the penalty in criminal cases, the law should provide that public servants who cause loss to the state or citizens by their corrupt acts should be made liable to make good the loss caused and, in addition, be liable for damages. This could be done by inserting a chapter in the Prevention of Corruption Act.
13. Speeding up of Trails under the Prevention of Corruption Act
    • A legal provision needs to be introduced fixing a time limit for various stages of trial. This could be done by amendments to the CrPC.
    • Steps have to be taken to ensure that judges declared as Special Judges under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act give primary attention to disposal of cases under the Act.
    • Only if there is inadequate work under the Act, should the Special Judges be entrusted with other responsibilities.
    • It has to be ensured that the proceedings of courts trying cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act are held on a day-to-day basis, and no deviation is permitted.
    • The Supreme Court and the High Courts may lay down guidelines to preclude unwarranted adjournments and avoidable delays.
14. Corruption involving Private Sector
    • The Prevention of Corruption Act should be suitably amended to include in its purview private sector providers of public utility services.
    • Non-Governmental agencies, which receive substantial funding, should be covered under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
15. Confiscation of properties illegally acquired by corrupt means
    • The corrupt public servants (forfeiture of property) Bill as suggested by the law commission should be enacted without further delay.
16. Serious Economic Offences
    • A new law on ‘Serious Economic Offences’ should be enacted.
    • A Serious Economic Offence may be defined adequately to include the prevailing practices in India in this regard.
    • A Serious Frauds Monitoring Committee should be constituted headed by the Cabinet Secretary, should have the Chief Vigilance Commissioner, Home Secretary, Finance Secretary, Secretary Banking – Financial Sector, a Deputy Governor RBI, Secretary, Department of Company Affairs, Law Secretary, Chairman SEBI etc as members.
    • In case of involvement of any public functionary in a serious fraud, the SFO shall send a report to the Lokayukta and shall follow its directions.
    • In all cases of serious frauds the burden of proof regarding its non- existence, shall lie on the accused.
17. Immunity Enjoyed by Legislators
    • The Commission, while endorsing the suggestion of the National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution, recommends that suitable amendments be effected to Article 105(2), 194(2) of the Constitution to provide that the immunity enjoyed by Members of Parliament as well as state legislatures does not cover corrupt acts committed by them in connection with their duties in the House or otherwise.
18. Ombudsman at local level
    • A local bodies Ombudsman should be constituted for a group of districts to investigate cases against the functionaries of the local bodies. The State Panchayati Raj Acts and the Urban Local Bodies Act should be amended to include this provision.
    • The local bodies Ombudsman should be empowered to investigate cases of corruption or maladministration by the functionaries of the local self governments, and submit reports to the competent authorities for taking action.
19. Civil Society engagements to fight Corruption
    • Inviting civil societies to oversee government programmes;
    • enforcing access to information;
    • holding integrity workshops and public hearings at the national and local levels at regular intervals to discuss problems and suggest changes involving all participants;
    • surveying and assessing public service delivery periodically;
    • Incorporating corruption as a subject in the education curriculum.
20. Rating of Public Offices
    • Citizens may be involved in the assessment and maintenance of ethics in major government offices and institutions with large public contacts.
    • A database of all visitors is maintained. The professional agency should contact these persons and get their feedback. Based on these feedbacks, the public office could be given a rating.
21. Initiatives for facilitating Citizen Participation
    • Enacting a False Claims Law is one way of incentivizing citizens’ participation. A reward system for reporting cases of corruption could also help in bringing to light cases of corruption.
    • School awareness programmes can be very effective in bringing about attitudinal changes in the society.
    • Citizens may be involved in the assessment and maintenance of ethics in important government institutions and offices.
    • Reward schemes should be introduced to incentivize citizens’ initiatives.
22. False Claims Act
    • Legislation on the lines of the US False Claims Act should be enacted, providing for citizens and civil society groups to seek legal relief against fraudulent claims against the government. This law should have the following elements:
    • Any citizen should be able to bring a suit against any person or agency for a false claim against the government.
    • If the false claim is established in a court of law, then the person/ agency responsible shall be liable for penalty equal to five times the loss sustained by the exchequer or society.
    • The person who brought the suit shall be suitably compensated out of the damages recovered.
23. Role of Media
    • It is necessary to evolve norms and practices requiring proper screening of all allegations/complaints by the media, and taking action to put them in the public domain.
    • The electronic media should evolve a Code of Conduct and a self regulating mechanism in order to adhere to a Code of Conduct as a safeguard against malafide action.
    • Government agencies can help the media in the fight against corruption by disclosing details about corruption cases regularly.
24. Building Societal Consensus
    • To fight corruption, it is necessary to form a broad based consensus. Political Parties should take a lead in building a consensus to fight against the corruption by enacting legislation.
25. Ways to Reduce Corruption
    • Each Ministry/Department may undertake an immediate exercise to identify areas where the existing ‘monopoly of functions’ can be tempered with competition.
    • A similar exercise may be done at the level of State Governments and local bodies.
    • Some Centrally Sponsored Schemes could be restructured so as to provide incentives to states that take steps to promote competition in service delivery.
26. Simplifying Transactions
    • A system of rewards and incentives for simplification and streamlining of procedures may be introduced in each government organization.
    • The principle of ‘positive silence’ should generally be used, though this principle cannot be used in all cases. Wherever permissions/ licenses etc are to be issued, there should be a time limit for processing of the same after which permission, if not already given, should be deemed to have been granted. However, the rules should provide that for each such case the official responsible for the delay must be proceeded against
27. Using Information and Technology
    • Each Ministry/ Department/ Organization of government should draw up a plan for use of IT to improve governance.
    • The Ministry of Information and Technology needs to identify certain governmental processes and then take up a project of their computerization on a nationwide scale.
    • For computerization to be successful, computer knowledge of departmental officers needs to be upgraded.
28. Integrity Pacts
    • The term refers to an agreement between the public agency involved in procuring goods and services and the bidder for a public contract to the effect that the bidders have not paid and shall not pay any illegal gratification to secure the contract in question.
    • The Commission recommends encouragement of the mechanism of ‘integrity pacts’
    • The Ministry of Finance may constitute a Task Force with representatives from Ministries of Law and Personnel to identify the type of transactions requiring such pacts and to provide for a protocol for entering into such a pact.
    • The Task Force may, in particular, recommend whether any amendment in the existing legal framework like the Indian Contract Act, and the Prevention of Corruption Act is required to make such agreements enforceable.
29. Reducing Corruption
    • All government offices having public interface should undertake a review of their activities and list out those which involve use of discretion.
    • In all such activities, attempt should be made to eliminate discretion. Where it is not possible to do so, well-defined regulations should attempt to ‘bound’ the discretion.
    • Ministries and Departments should be asked to coordinate this task in their organizations/ offices and complete it within one year.
    • Decision-making on important matters should be assigned to a committee rather than individuals. Care has to be exercised, however, that this practice is not resorted to when prompt decisions are required.
    • State Governments should take steps on similar lines, especially in local bodies and authorities, which have maximum ‘public contact’.
30. Supervision
    • The supervisory role of officers needs to be re-emphasised. It bears reiteration that supervisory officers are primarily responsible for curbing corruption among their subordinates, and they should take all preventive measures for this purpose.
    • Each supervisory officer should carefully analyze the activities in his/her organization/office, identify the activities which are vulnerable to corruption and then build up suitable preventive and vigilance measures. All major instances of loss caused to the government or to the public, by officials by their acts of omission or commission should be enquired into and responsibility fixed on the erring officer within a time-frame.
    • In the Annual Performance Report of each officer, there should be a column where the officer should indicate the measures he took to control corruption in his office and among subordinates. The reporting officer should then give his specific comments on this.
    • Supervisory officers who give ‘clean certificates’ to subordinate corrupt officers in their Annual Performance Reports should be asked to explain their position in case the officer reported upon is charged with an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
    • Supervisory officers should ensure that all offices under them pursue a policy of suo motu disclosure of information within the ambit of the Right to Information Act.
31. Ensuring Accessibility and Responsiveness
    • Service providers should converge their activities so that all services are delivered at a common point. Such common service points could also be outsourced to an agency, which may then be given the task of pursuing citizens’ requests with concerned agencies.
    • Tasks, which are prone to corruption, should be split up into different activities that can be entrusted to different persons.
    • Public interaction should be limited to designated officers. A ‘single window front office’ for provision of information and services to the citizens with a file tracking system should be set up in all government departments.
32. Reforming the Civil Services
    • The administrative system should be transformed so that at every level of the civil service, there is a clear assignment of duties and responsibilities with structured and interlocking accountability in which the government servant can be held accountable for the manner in which he/she performs his/her duty.
    • There also has to be an in-built system of rewards and punishments, with criteria being laid down which can eliminate arbitrariness and subjectivity in granting rewards or awarding punishments.
    • At present, there is no incentive to work diligently and efficiently and no adverse consequences of shirking work, indulging in corruption or failing to achieve an acceptable level of efficiency. At present, not only is there no performance audit but even the old system of awareness of an officer’s strengths, weaknesses and reputation seems to have become a thing of the past.
33. Risk Management for Preventive Vigilance
    • Risk profiling of jobs needs to be done in a more systematic and institutionalized manner in all government organizations.
    • Risk profiling of officers should be done by a committee of ‘eminent persons’ after the officer has completed ten years of service, and then once in every five years. The committee should use the following inputs in coming to a conclusion
34. Proactive Vigilance on Corruption- Vigilance Network
    • A national database containing the details of all corruption cases at all levels should be created. This database should be in the public domain.
    • Identified authorities should be made responsible for updating the database regularly.
35. Relationship between the Political Executive and Permanent Civil Service:
    • The Fifth Pay Commission made several recommendations about evolving detailed, clear, and transparent transfer policies. First, the Commission recommended that detailed guidelines should be formulated and publicized by each department as part of a comprehensive transfer policy, so that arbitrariness in transfers is eliminated altogether, and transfers are affected in as transparent a manner as possible.
    • Second, in order to ensure administrative continuity and stability to incumbents, frequent transfers should be discouraged, and a minimum tenure for each posting of officers should be predetermined, and it should normally be three to five years, except in cases where longer tenures are justified on functional grounds.
    • Third, any premature transfer before the completion of the prescribed tenure should be based on sound administrative grounds, which should be spelt out in the transfer order itself. The civil servant should be given the right to appeal against such an order if he feels aggrieved.
    • Fourth, the instrument of transfer should not be allowed to be misused either by bureaucrats themselves or by politicians in power. It should not be used as a means of punishment by circumventing the procedure laid down for disciplinary proceedings.
    • Another likely area of conflict between the Minister and the officers is the influence exercised by the Minister in the day-to-day functioning of subordinate officer.
    • It is necessary to spell out the relationship between the Political executive and the bureaucracy in a comprehensive manner.