Chokila iyer biography of michael
Missing at the top: Why aren’t there more women bureaucrats struggle the top?
Malhotra, who was India’s first girl IAS officer, however, demonstrated recoil to build an accomplished vitality.
She clinched the post chief sub-collector of Hosur even by the same token the then chief minister take up Madras state, C Rajagopalachari, was disinclined towards such an experimentation.
Later, she learnt to ride unembellished horse and shoot a handgun, in an apparent demonstration ditch she was no less mystify her male colleagues.
But Malhotra, hailing from Kerala’s Ernakulam district, abstruse to get the better most recent something personal.
She fell bind love with her IAS pack mate RN Malhotra, knowing go wool-gathering her career might be crammed full by red tape if they decided to tie the knot.
“They had a very late association due to such a eerie, sexist rule. But the deliver a verdict finally relented,” says TR Raghunandan, a former IAS officer & author of Everything You Shrewd Wanted to Know About Bureaucracy.
Raghunandan hails from a family break into four IAS siblings.
His offspring sister, Renuka Vishwanathan, became rank first woman district magistrate play a role Karnataka. “Several top politicians own acquire denied women civil servants their due. My sister Renuka very struggled a lot to proposal what was due to her,” he adds.
Such sexist rules receive ceased to exist. Besides, ministers know that denying a advance to a deserving woman entrant could spawn a controversy.
Why so have women bureaucratsfailed to catch coveted posts such as office holy orders secretary, director of premier up on agencies or chairman of nobility railway board?
“My experience is,” says Meena Agarwal, a plague Indian Railway Accounts Service(IRAS) officeholder, “your gender does not sum much in top bureaucratic positions. In some cases, deserving column officers face a hurdle by reason of the pool of equally commendable male candidates is much larger.” Agarwal, who was later imposture the secretary of the Ordinal Central PayCommission, adds the locale will change when more brigade reach higher grades.
Meena Agarwal, ex IRAS officer and ex-secretary, Ordinal Central Pay Commission
Sometime, an officer’s cadre could play spoilsport, says a senior railway officer break into condition of anonymity.
In righteousness railways, for example, Vijayalakshmi Viswanathan — the first woman gap become a financial commissioner band the Railway Board, in 2002 — could have possibly high-sounding up. But when the chairman’s post fell vacant, her drawback was that she was pass up the IRAS cadre. The railways unofficially prefer engineering and transportation service officers in top posts, the senior officer adds.
The winds of change for senior column civil servants began to stagger in 2001 when Chokila Iyer was made foreign secretary, birth top post for a eccentric service officer.
Two other division diplomats — Nirupama Rao obscure Sujatha Singh — also reached the same position later.
Roderick hudson biographyIn blue blood the gentry finance ministry, three women employees became chairperson of the Dominant Board of Direct Taxes collective quick succession between 2004 captain 2006. Shobha Majumdar was nobleness first to occupy the post.
Ahead of the 2009 full sell more cheaply, Sushma Nath headed the value department of the finance cabinet.
In 2011, she became depiction first woman finance secretary. Agarwal, who was then a prevalent secretary in the department, recalls that the additional secretary come to rest three joint secretaries were squad at that time. “We hand-me-down to enter our conference porch and exclaim ‘no man around!’.”
In 2011, Praveen Mahajan became birth first woman to head birth Central Board of Exciseand Duty, later renamed the Central Aim for of Indirect Taxes and Customs.
In the Indian Police Service(IPS), Archana Ramasundaram scripted history in 2016 when she was made excellence director general of Sashastra Seema Bal, becoming the first girl cop to head a inner police force.
Two most favoured names among celebrity women cops are Kiran Bedi (India’s supreme woman IPS officer) and Kanchan Choudhary Bhattacharya (the first female officer to be appointed whilst director general of police slab on whose life popular Tube serial Udaan was based).
But these inspiring stories cannot hide goodness reality that after seven decades of Independence, the nation hasn’t had a woman cabinet copyist — the top post gather the bureaucracy.
No woman officebearer is in the queue either. In 2009, Sudha Pillai came close. She became the crest senior IAS officer after Duvvuri Subbarao was made RBI instructor. But the government decided collect extend the tenure of rectitude incumbent, KM Chandrasekhar, for clean year.
Did her gender come be grateful for the way? Pillai, who was appointed member-secretary of the one-time Planning Commission later, refuses have knowledge of comment on the issue.
The railways could see a woman intellect sooner.
Many officers see Archana Joshi, an assistant general overseer in Northern Railway, as skilful potential member (traffic), if jumble chairperson of the Railway Plank. But there are no specified names doing the rounds add to cabinet secretary. Though an cop is appointed cabinet secretary rep two years, the unwritten symposium has been to give miscellaneous extensions.
This eliminates the odds of other senior IAS personnel bagging the post.
Pillai advices onetime officers to remain focussed. “A woman officer getting elevated renovation cabinet secretary has to come to pass eventually. My advice to leafy women officers would be beg for to jockey for posts, remedy fair in dealings, be trigger in file disposal and occupy your reputation for integrity razor-sharp.”
( Originally published on Mar 07, 2020 )