Naveen Patnaik is just class apart on every front when compared with any other famous politicians. He is indeed the simplest among those known for their simple lifestyle. Naveen’s very dress, which hasn’t changed in decades since he became a high-level politician, makes him stand out so glaringly. Mamata Banerjee is the only one who sports ordinary quality sarees, Hawaii chappals and no cosmetic application at all. But she is frighteningly theatrical, noisy and crude in public behaviour. She is horrifically reactive to even healthy criticism; she hurls hard-hitting and hurting words at opponents no matter if the person is the Prime Minister. So, she, despite her extremely humble dress, loses heavily to Naveen on simplicity and simple behaviour.
Naveen turned 74 on yesterday. The longest-serving chief minister of India, routinely with a huge number of followers, could have a small celebration of birthday. But, sensible that he is, Naveen made it clear before that he would not have any birthday celebration at all mainly because the thousands of the Fani-affected people had not been out of distress as yet. Obviously, the good people around him extolled the sanest decision as divine. But the sycophants, quite big in number, obviously sticking around him for private gains, may have expressed sadness as if the heavens had come crashing down.
Naveen, though a very soft-spoken, quiet-loving gentleman, is very firm on principles. He must have discarded most of the flatterers when they may have entered his home campus. He strongly believes a people’s leader doesn’t make much sense by having his own birthday even observed, let alone celebrated when people, depending on his decisions for a good life, are suffering.
Just a fortnight earlier on the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, Naveen launched the 'Mo Sarkar' initiative. The Chief Minister made personal phone calls to people in Balangir, Sundargarh, Malkangiri, Jajpur and Baripada to seek feedbacks on their experiences at Government hospitals where healthcare services are expected to be given to all without fees or hassles. This unique exercise is looked upon as a most people-friendly initiative which serious political leaders of the world are watching in awe.
Mo Sarkar is perhaps the most notable of all known good governance experiments across the developing world, typically in thickly-populated democratic regimes of the second and the third world (second world comprising the communist block of Europe, though, has lost relevance since quite some time).
The Mo Sarkar initiative is all about the chief political executive coming in direct contact with the masses to make out what ails them the most. As is popularly believed, the police and hospital functionaries, expected to be polite and respectful to the people in distress, have been erring grossly on behaviour front. The policeman and the doctor are equally callous and cruel to people in urgent need of help. So, Naveen first set down to know what’s cooking around these two locations at critical times of need. He listened to people’s experience of utter woe from Nayagah, Ganjam, Baleswar and Bhawanipatna by using high-tech communication equipments, videoconferences to interact with the masses face to face. This first-of-its-kind service made people feel enormously empowered and dignified. The latest report in hand says people of Odisha are just revelling over the event and are vastly at ease for being sure their woes are to vanish soon and for good because the trustworthy boss is taking stock personally to solve their problems.
Naveen is a very genuine human being with a big heart for the backward communities. He has invariably given top priority to poverty alleviation by trying to remove corruption from public agencies; generating maximum employment for the youth by attracting big players to invest in Odisha; arresting migration of the distressed farmers; and, above all, empowering the masses by ensuring good governance which means people get their entitlements without hitch or hassle.
The reticent, gentleman Chief Minister is an exceedingly intelligent person as his exposure to the wider world is immense and wisdom gathered huge. He is not a foolish boss to meddle into the ground-level nitty-gritty. The commendable tactic he employs unfailingly is delegating tasks to very thoroughly tested bureaucrats who are truly sincere, selfless and fast in delivering to the end-users. After Pyari Mohapatra, his the then principal advisor, messed up on the power-sharing front by guile, Naveen got wiser and picked his lieutenants himself after scrutinising individual bureaucrats by putting them to rigorous tests. Quite a few fitted his design. One of them, V Karthikeyan Pandian, a rather young IAS officer, was given charge to help him on every critical administrative move. Karthikeyan is a quiet, composed, hardworking guy with robust commonsense. He took charge when the rest of the world believed the young boy would only burn out in months as Naveen is an incredibly hard taskmaster. What followed from thereon is already history. Karthikeyan has been guiding the boss strictly on the administration. Naveen is made aware of the rules and norms by Karthikeyan to take all critical political decisions. Such a phenomenon is very normal and routine all across the civilised world of governance. So, Karthikeyan has been made the Secretary of the 5T wing which is part of the Chief Minister's outfit. Most certainly, no other functionary would have fitted the post better than this young 2000-batch IAS officer. Any other officer would have groped in dark trying to figure out tough taskmaster Naveen’s ways and aspirations.
There has been a great deal of murmur about Karthikeyan running the show, which is only a perception not backed by logic. Naveen makes his wishes clear; and of course, Karthikeyan makes sure the noble wishes come true by constituting down the line, perfectly chosen bureaucratic teams that are skilled to deliver.
Not surprisingly, when the matter of good governance came up, Naveen was keen to have someone in place who understood his ways of life, his aspirations apart from his strong likes and dislikes. Karthikeyan having worked with him as a close aide for more than seven long years was chosen to be the good governance guy.
The team led by him conceptualised the 5T approach; and, thus, the Mo Sarkar initiative was launched on the auspicious 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi only a fortnight ago. The good governance team has been very effectively swooping in on the State-run hospitals and police stations where officials were suspected to have been erring on duty for long.
The Mo Sarkar initiative under the 5T programme is, of course, heralding the desired transformation in Government offices. Every State institution or agency is realising faster than usual that to serve citizens with dignity is their sole responsibility. The State functionaries are getting to know the perspective right that they are only mere servants to the people who are the masters and whose coffers give them livelihood.
Thus, Naveen, for being the serving boss for a quarter century, has superb plans for giving a much better quality of life to the distressed and the downtrodden communities. He has also as much packages for making available ‘ease of doing business environments' for the real daring entrepreneurs and investors to set up establishments that will make money essentially by generating employment for the youth.
Naveen keeps setting examples that are certain to inspire anyone keen on becoming ruler. His simplicity, humility and, particularly, his silence over bitter criticism by detractors and opponents make him stand out as a unique political boss. No matter what the critics may say for saying sake, they know pretty much the truth: Naveen is a compassionate ruler, which makes him so invincible!
