Madhya Pradesh CM Yadav criticised for over-reliance on bureaucrats and sidelining senior leaders.
New Delhi: On 11 December last year, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had secured what many termed as a surprise victory in Madhya Pradesh by winning 163 of the total 230 assembly seats. It was all but sure that one from Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Prahlad Singh Patel, Narendra Tomar, VD Sharma or Kailash Vijayvargiya, , the ‘big’ leader from the state will take oath as the new Chief Minister.
At around 4:30 p.m. on December 11, a group picture of all the newly elected MLAs was taken at the party’s headquarters in Bhopal. Along with the MLAs, present in the picture were BJP’s central observers: then Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar, party’s OBC Morcha chief K. Lakshman, national secretary Asha Lakra, and State Joint General Secretary (Organization) Hitanand Sharma. Sitting in the third row, unaware of what was to happen in the next hour, and behind Sharma, was Mohan Yadav, a third-time MLA from Ujjain South, giving his trademark suppressed smile.
One hour later, contrary to media reports, speculations, and educated guesses—after the MLAs had given their recommendations for the leader, with some reports suggesting that Chauhan had received the most votes—it was announced that the new Chief Minister of the state would be Yadav.
One year after Yadav took the oath as Chief Minister, he has begun to carve out his own identity while attempting to fill the large shoes of his predecessor, Chouhan. However, in an interesting paradox, he finds himself repeating one of Chouhan’s biggest drawbacks: relying on bureaucrats to run the state.
Chouhan, despite being a mass leader and arguably second only to his party colleague, UP CM Yogi Adityanath, in terms of popularity at the time, struggled to break free from his reliance—eventually over-reliance—on officials from the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and Indian Police Service (IPS). He failed to learn from leaders like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah, his predecessor Uma Bharti, and Congress CMs like Digvijaya Singh and Ajit Jogi, who, while working closely with the powerful bureaucrats, never allowed them to dictate the terms.
It was due to this weakness that Chouhan lost control over administration and few babus became ‘super CM’ of Bhopal leaving many elected MLAs, ministers and MP far behind when it came to taking and overriding decisions and making policies.
Mohan Yadav, whose first year as Chief Minister was spent dealing with the long shadow of Chouhan—including shifting loyalists from the previous regime—now faces accusations of falling into the same pattern: relying on bureaucrats for direction, rather than providing them with guidance.
This has also led to discontent among the other senior leaders of the state, who have not gotten over the fact that their more rightful claim over the CM chair was not given to them, this anger has been compounded over the fact the Chief Minister Office and few bureaucrats and not the CM is running the show.
There are 384 IAS officers allotted to Madhya Pradesh, out of which 42 are on central deputation while two are on study leave.What has also generated a negative perception against Yadav is his perceived favouritism for few bureaucrats. Sandeep Yadav, a Haryana born IAS of 2000 batch is now seen as among the most closest official to Yadav, holding multiple portfolios including Principal Secretary- Public Health & Medical Education, Principal Secretary- Bhopal Gas Tragedy Relief & Rehabilitation (BGTR) , Principal Secretary-NRI Department and Commissioner Food Safety. Similarly, Bharat Yadav, 2008 batch IAS officer is Secretary to CM and Commissioner, Urban Administration.
Similar perception had developed about Chouhan, with a few selected IAS running the state. Multiple BJP state and national functionaries told the Sunday Guardian that that relying overly on bureaucrats is a perception that has become associated with Yadav, who was picked by PM Modi and Home minister Shah to give a new and fresh perspective to the way the state’s administration is run.
Party functionaries in the state BJP did not share their comments on the issue when reached for a response by the newspaper.However, sources in the party who are perceived as close to the CM said that it was wrong to say that Yadav was ‘over-dependent’ on bureaucrats.
According to them this perception has more to do with the previous system when the bureaucrats were more important than the elected representatives, something which Yadav has been consciously trying to dismantle and facing resistance.According to them it was also a case of Yadav being relatively ‘inexperienced’ while handling such a huge responsibility and hence depending on few bureaucrats for guidance.