THIS refers to letters on 'Pakistan Civil Services' (Aug 1). Probably, the main reason for deterioration of quality of inductees into the Pakistan Civil Service may be the growing ratio of members inducted into the service on the basis of provincial quotas.

Originally, merit was seen as the essential condition for induction into the public service. The low quotas were to be completely given up for merit in one decade.

However, the ratio of regional quota has been growing the last increase made by Shaukat Aziz raised the share of regional quota appointments to 90 per cent, leaving only 10 per cent induction on merit.

It has been established through studies that IQ distribution in Pakistan is even through all regions. I believe that sooner or later we will have to decide that merit should be the only basis for induction into our civil services.

The American experience with allocation of places in universities and federal services to blacks and other disadvantaged sections of the population has shown that quotas actually harm the groups who were supposed to benefit from them.

Quotas seem to discourage bright young people from doing their best as this is not deemed necessary while quotas exist. In any case, by definition, quota means that many of the more qualified candidates do not get appointments.

I have been told by some psychologists working for the Federal Public Service Commission that large ratio of the people who go into federal services has high-power needs. They join the service for the power and prestige and not for achievement or self-actualisation.

Moreover, it is significant that over the decades the attractiveness of various services has been changing. In the early days, the Foreign Service was ideal for the brightest candidates. It was soon replaced by the District Management Group as the most desirable.

Later, Income Tax and Customs became the most attractive groups of our civil services. In the last couple of decades, the police service has become the most desired for high-performing candidates.

Due to the changing economic and political conditions, as well as due to the increasing ration of allocation of seats on the basis of regional quotas, there is a growing shortage of bright young men and women from Karachi and Lahore who seek entry into Pakistan Civil Service.

Senior officials in Sindh are concerned about this development. The brightest seem to prefer jobs in the private sector and professions where salaries are much higher than in the public service. Salaries of members of our Civil Services should be improved substantially.

In the end, I would like Umar Riaz to please read this paragraph from his letter you published which seems to give us some idea of what he thinks about some of the people he has to deal with “...profit-hungry businessmen or mealy-mouthed, ignorant private sector employees, shortsighted and parochial politicians and hard-to-miss charlatans posing as analysts and experts on the electronic media...”

The sweeping negative regarding stereotypes is rather disappointing. The officer must have been unusually angry at the time of writing these lines. In my personal experience, I have found senior government officials to be poised, bright, gracious, and generally quite reasonable.

As a parting thought I present this quotation from A. N. Whitehead (etched on the pillar of a great business school) “Any nation which does not respect its businessmen cannot be great.”

DANISHMAND
Dean
Faculty of Management Sciences
International Islamic University
Islamabad