4 July : President Pratibha Devisingh Patil has asked civil servants to adopt a development-centric and people friendly approach to prevent corruption and play creative role in the development of the country.
Addressing the Golden Jubliee Celebration of the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration in Musoorie, the President urged the civil servants to change the business as usual attitude and find innovative means within the system to make it responsive to the needs of people.
She asked them to change the image of bureaucracy from red tapism and opaqueness to bring transparency and accountability in the system.
Expressing serious concern over the pilferage of money from the system and not reaching the intended beneficiaries, Patil urged the officers to utilise the resources for the purpose they were intended for, be it construction of road, school, hospital, irrigation system, seeds for farmers, welfare schemes for SCs, STs and women and employment opportunities.
”If you do this, you would have been successful in making the IAS, the Indian Admirable Service. In this way you will have earned the gratitude and good wishes of millions of our people who place so much hope upon you,” she said.
The President pointed out that to achieve this goal there was the need for adopting a strategic, need, outcome and competency-based approach to civil servants training to make it directly related to the development needs of the country.