Weighty question

Jobs for the boys is an honoured though unwritten rule ba­bus live by. For soon-to-be ex-babus, it is indeed a comf­o­r­ting thought that they need not fade away immediately from pu­blic life. But the partisan sniping that has greeted the ap­pointment of telecom secretary P.J. Thomas as the new Ch­i­ef Vigilance Commissioner has raised discomforting questi­o­ns for the government, even as it vehemently defends its choice.
For a sensitive position such as the one Mr Thomas has been given, it could be expected that not all political parties would agree with the government’s choice. The Bharatiya Janata Party has already raked up the issue of Mr Thomas’ alleged tainted past, and claimed that the babu from Kerala was appointment with the aim of covering up wrongdoings in the 2G spectrum allocation case as well as the Commonwealth Games projects. This charge, though, has failed to cut ice with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and home minister P. Chidambaram. Still babu-watchers wonder why the government chose to name Mr Thomas when it had other heavyweight candidates — finance secretary Ashok Chawla, ex-agriculture secretary Nand Kumar and secretary for personnel Shantanu Consul were also in the fray. Clearly, that’s a question that’s not going to be answered and only Mr Thomas’ own track record will silence the carping critics.

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Headless museum
It’s the familiar tale of the continuing neglect of India’s cultural institutions. For the past three years, the National Museum in the capital has been without a professionally qualified head, and is being managed by a babu on ad hoc basis. The last person to head the nation’s most prestigious museum was A.K.V.S. Reddy. But since his departure, the ministry for culture has been unable to find a suitable candidate, even after relaxing the requirement criteria — any masters degree and five years’ experience in running a museum. Moreover, sources say, some 140-150 posts — out of the 207 sanctioned — are yet to be filled.
Earlier this year, a high-level search-and-selection committee, which included Cabinet secretary K.M. Chandrasekhar, culture secretary Jawhar Sircar, and personnel secretary Shantanu Co­nsul, failed to find a suitable person for the post of director-general. The panel had offered the position to well-known mu­seum professional Mahrukh Tarapor, currently with the Metr­o­politan Museum of Art in New York, who, not surprisingly, turned down the offer. Culture babus however pass the buck to the Un­ion Public Service Commission and its rules for fi­lling the vacancies at the museum. In the ongoing bureauc­r­atic wrangling, the museum is clearly the unfortunate victim.