Splitting up ministries

Reportedly, the government is contemplating splitting up five ministries into several divisions each. Of the proposed five, two, home and education, have already received the PM's approval. The other three, namely health & family welfare, LGRD & cooperatives, and civil aviation & tourism, are yet to. 

There are two aspects of the proposed arrangement. One, it would make the larger ministries enhance their output. Two, something that is not so openly articulated, it would allow the government to enlarge the cabinet and accommodate to higher positions a very large number of officers holding the same job in the promoted rank that they were holding before promotion. We hope this is not the principal reason, in which case it would be ill advised.

On the other hand there is strong rationale for some ministries to be broken up into divisions, more so, with the increase in our population and in the variety of subjects a government has to deal with these days. And thus the move to split the home and education ministries into separate divisions, each charged with a separate or a cluster of related subjects, is timely. We also think the splitting of the health and LGRD & cooperatives may also be justified. It is the civil aviation & tourism that we have serious questions about. The ministry is too small for a split. Also Biman is supposed to be run by an independent board without the ministry meddling in it.

Breaking up ministries may not necessarily increase productivity. We believe the underlying principle for such an arrangement must be efficiency and efficiency alone. We hope that is the case.