With an intent of giving bureaucracy a greater role in decision-making, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in three hour long meeting with secretaries of all the government departments collectively, asked them to directly get in touch with him to resolve policy issues and expedite decision-making.
Just to ensure that implementation of decisions and programmes were not stuck in red-tape, PM asked secretaries to call him or e-mail him directly for suggestions or intervention required in resolving issues or expediting decisions making process.
In all, 77 top bureaucrats, including finance secretary Arvind Mayaram, home secretary Anil Goswami, defence secretary Radha Krishna Mathur and foreign secretary Sujatha Singh, were called for the meeting and for the meeting sixteen groups were formed by clubbing related ministries.
While, all finance ministry departments were grouped together, secretaries of energy-related departments, power, coal, oil, mines and atomic energy, were clubbed. Additionally, Agriculture and related departments were put together, with the infrastructure group comprising of railways, telecom, roads, civil aviation, shipping and posts.
Further, notes of finance ministry officials for the meeting with the prime minister included inflation, fiscal consolidation, controlling the current account deficit, clarity on tax administration and disinvestments in non-core sectors like steel and cement.