Duty and Devotion – A study of a guiding principle

By Subhash Jangala

Organizations are figments of human imagination. You cannot see or feel one. You might find its name in the registrar’s office or its logo on a hoarding. But the organization in itself is an idea in the minds of like-minded people who agreed to believe in its existence. Consequently, each individual carries every morning to work, a tiny portion of his or her organization. To ensure the organization moves in the direction that it was originally intended to, the like-minded people impose upon themselves certain rules that govern the organization. Small structures have simpler rules and large institutions have much more complex ones. There are perhaps few organizations in the world as large as government bureaucracies and few bureaucracies as intricate as the Indian Civil Services. The rules that govern the Indian bureaucracy can be largely called the Conduct Rules.

Enacted in 1964, this is an elaborate set of rules, rulings and directives that governs the colossal bureaucratic structure of the country. Like timeless masterpieces of every age, the Conduct Rules too profess certain fundamental principles. Most of the substance in the Rules is a clarification or an elucidation of these core canons. One such principle is devotion to duty. Career bureaucrats are expected to imbibe, implement and demonstrate this attribute throughout their tenures.

Along with integrity and secrecy, devotion to duty has been omnipresent amongst the founding principles of armed forces, judiciaries and government bodies across the world. Consequently, devotion to duty was a natural fit into the lofty ideals that post-independence political masters expected of their officers. But what is devotion to duty? A historical study of the concept throws light on how the present day Indian bureaucracy can benefit immensely from re-affirming itself to this enduring doctrine.

In the year 1910, while deciding upon a case of sedition in Emperor vs. Shankar Shrikrishna Dev, Justice Chandavarkar of the Bombay High Court traced the oldest possible reference to devotion to duty to the 3rd chapter of the Bhagavad Gita. In this chapter on Karma Yoga, Krishna exhorts Arjuna to surrender himself perfectly in his duties, free of ego, free from grief and free from desire. Krishna’s devotion to duty is an absolute immersion in the responsibilities placed on an individual by his profession, his family and his society with no fear or favour. This transcendental view of devotion to duty was reflected in Swami Vivekananda’s designation of devotion to duty as the highest form of worship in his speeches in California in 1900, Rabindranath Tagore’s announcement in his 1916 novel, The Home and the World that his work is his salvation and the Mahatma’s 1929 letter in which he identified devotion to duty as prayer itself. He said, “When one is engaged in the actual practice of duty, prayer is merged with the execution of duty”.

These metaphysical views on the concept translated strongly into modern Indian thought. The fight for independence in the 19th and 20th centuries gave devotion to duty an operational and utilitarian outlook. While Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar, in one of his letters from London observed, “The duty must be performed … with a sincerity of purpose”, Subhash Chandra Bose, in his order of 1944, praised the valiant troops of Azad Hind Fauj for breaching the British defences in Kohima by saluting their devotion to duty. Bose’s devotion to duty was characterized by righteousness of cause, unshakeable determination and dauntless courage. The capstone in defining devotion to duty in this era however would unquestionably go to Pandit Nehru’s 1950 eulogy for Sardar Patel in the Parliament. “A lover of India with an inflexible sense of discipline and patient courage”, Nehru said Sardar’s labour for the country was the highlight of his devotion to duty.

Independence marked the beginning of a new era in political India. Having achieved the establishment of a democratic republic, the freedom struggle transformed into an administrative one. The objectives of reversing two centuries of apathy and instituting an egalitarian society demanded similar if not more devotion to duty from the new masters – now Indian in birth and thought. The underlying duty ceased to be the all-encompassing, pan-India objective of freedom. Duties were now more regional, organisational and personal. The quality of devotion that was required was however the same.

Post-independence heroes like Sam Manekshaw, Homi Bhabha and APJ Abdul Kalam amongst others set benchmarks for devotion to duty in a developing Bharat. The Apex court of the country too, over the last 75 years, adjudicated on several issues of devotion to duty, highlighting the importance of the concept and the proper interpretation of the same by subordinate courts and tribunals. In the year 1958, a Supreme Court judgement indicated how the devotion to duty of a doctor on a remote tea estate in Dibrugarh can lead to a fundamental transformation in industrial dispute litigation in the country. In a 1964 judgement, the Supreme Court observed how impartiality and fairness is an integral component of devotion to duty. The Court held that panels granting marks in interviews for admission to medical colleges are to exhibit the highest levels of devotion to duty to ensure the best quality of professionals. The Supreme Court in 1990 emphasized the importance of protecting those officials who displayed devotion to duty from arbitrary termination without following due process.

Devotion to duty, as a moral tenet, has been discussed in India since several millennia. It is remarkable that the concept has endured and made its way into regulations that govern 21st century bureaucracy. The principle is surprisingly agile too. Whether it is a nurse at a panchayat hospital, a Colonel at the border or a percussionist in front of his audience, application of the principle brings immediate clarity and conviction. Devotion to Duty perhaps sits at the heart of most gallant decisions people take in fulfilling the responsibilities their families, their employers and their country have placed on them, without even realizing it. Devotion to duty in its purest form is a timeless charm of immediate practical applicability. As the country marches ahead into an era of breakneck innovation, complex geopolitical considerations and a domestic recovery after the pandemic, it is an opportune time for all servants of Bharat, both civil and uniformed to re-look at this eternal ideal and re-discover the relationship with their duties.

(The author belongs to the 2011 batch of the Indian Revenue Service and is posted as Joint Director in the Directorate General of Administration and Taxpayer Services in New Delhi. Views expressed are personal and do not reflect the official position or policy of Financial Express Online. Reproducing this content without permission is prohibited.)