Wass Up 2013: Read the mind of a young woman DM posted in an UP district

Cleopatra: A painting by IAS Shubhra Saxena

BORED with gossips in the corridors, or doses of bureaucracy-bashing? As we are getting closer to the New Year, hopefully lucky 13, here is the tale of a young woman IAS, who was recently welcomed at Uttar Pradesh’s Shravasti district with slogans “ziladhikari Shravasti zindabad”. And this is how this 2009 batch IAS introduces herself in her blog post: “Hi I am...
Shubhra Saxena. I am an engineer from IIT Roorkee 2002 batch of paper technology. I am currently posted as District Magistrate, Shravasti, Uttar Pradesh.” Her favourite films: Chak De India, A beautiful Mind and Swades. And her favourite book: Atlas Shrugged, We the living.
In her blog post titled “First posting as District Collector”, Ms Shubhra writes how people have such low expectations from administration that “even the most mundane thing I would do here would be huge for them”.
“After joining Shravasti, I inspected a Block Resource Center of SSA where training of teachers was going on. As expected, most teachers were absent. I took immediate action against the teachers. When I came out... People there were shouting slogans... "ziladhikari Shravasti zindabad". I felt humbled to my core…” Ms Shubhra writes.
And she has a few tips for civil service aspirants too. “All of you are aspiring for civil services. Some of you will make it to IAS, some to IPS, some to IFS and so on. On the way to these services, you face so many roadblocks in terms of failure, loss of motivation and many other factors unaccounted for. You feel as if once you get into the service, you would have all solutions.
But from an insider’s perspective, the day you enter a service, the real battle starts. It’s not a cakewalk I assure you. But even despite many constraints, there’s so much difference you can make just by being efficient, fair and honest…” she writes.
BoI wishes a very Happy New Year to its readers. ...And it promises to share in 2013 some of the fascinating stories of Indian and foreign bureaucrats who take the administrative challenges head on and raise the bar for their juniors. Happy reading!