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Why Aren’t IAS Officers Held Accountable for Failed Projects?

In India, when a public project succeeds, an officer’s name is prominently displayed. There are press conferences, social-media posts, glowing profiles, awards, appreciation letters and carefully photographed inauguration ceremonies. The officer is described as the “brain behind the transformation,” the “architect of change” or the “driving force” behind the project.

But when the same project fails, suddenly nobody has a name.

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The officer becomes merely one member of a committee. The consultant prepared the design. The engineer supervised the work. The contractor executed it. The department released the money. The weather was unusually severe. The population increased unexpectedly. The infrastructure was inherited. The problem was historical.

Success has a father. Failure has an entire government department.

This is the great bureaucratic magic trick of India: an officer can personally own every ribbon when a project is inaugurated but become institutionally invisible when the ribboned project begins to collapse.

The question, therefore, is not whether IAS officers can legally be held accountable. They certainly can.

The All India Services (Discipline and Appeal) Rules expressly provide for penalties including censure, withholding of promotion, withholding of increments and even recovery from salary of losses caused to the government through negligence or breach of orders. Major penalties can include reduction in rank, compulsory retirement, removal and dismissal. The legal toolbox already exists.

The problem is that the toolbox is usually opened only when there is an allegation of corruption, a vigilance case, a criminal investigation or an embarrassing scandal that can no longer be buried under official vocabulary.

Plain administrative failure rarely produces consequences.

A road may disintegrate soon after construction. A drainage project may leave a city waterlogged. A hospital may remain incomplete for years. A bridge may become unusable. A development scheme may consume crores without producing its promised result. Yet the officer who headed, monitored or publicly championed the project may simply be transferred to another department.

The project remains behind as a monument to failure.

The officer moves ahead with a clean career.

Because India evaluates whether money was sanctioned, whether tenders were issued, whether........

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