The current system has roots in 1958 when the East India Company transferred the dominion to the British crown, he said. He said the objective of the civil servants then was to go slow and delay implementation because the native population was to be kept under control.
Speaking at a media event, he said that the government should look beyond the present system where the candidates appear for the highly competitive exam conducted by the Union Public Services Commission (UPSC) by giving an examination in three or four subjects.
The selected candidates should be taken to the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy Of Administration in Mussoorie for training in specialized sectors such as agriculture, defence or manufacturing. He said it would be a departure from the current practice of creating general administrators.
“Maybe Prime Minister Modi, who has done a brilliant job so far in terms of accelerating our economy, may want to look at whether we need more managers in the government rather than administrators,” Narayan Murthy said.