PRESIDENT Droupadi Murmu on Monday said a compassionate civil servant whose heart beats for the poor and the underprivileged is a true civil servant as distinct from merely a career bureaucrat. Addressing a group of Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers, she said uplifting the marginalised sections of society should be an article of faith for them. “You should make efforts to understand the link between ‘file to field’ and also between ‘field to file’. This people-centric alertness and sensitivity will make you engage with the files in a far more meaningful manner,” Murmu said. The President asked the officers to always visualise the people who are going to be impacted by the files “you deal with.”

 

A group of 182 IAS officers of 2021 batch, currently posted as Assistant Secretaries in various Union Ministries and departments, had called on Murmu at the Rashtrapati Bhawan Cultural Centre here. “I have seen from close quarters the difficulties and problems faced by the people living in backward areas and belonging to the deprived segments of our society. I have also seen some sensitive civil servants who went the extra mile to help such people,” she said. A compassionate civil servant whose heart beats for the poor and the underprivileged is a true civil servant as distinct from merely a career bureaucrat, the President said.

 

She said an inclusive, progressive and sensitive society allows greater space to women. “The nation is on the path of women empowerment and women-led development. I am very happy that the historic ‘Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam’ has been passed by both the Houses of Parliament. Women are breaking stereotypes and the glass ceiling. They are playing increasingly larger roles in all aspects of growth and development,” Murmu said. She was happy over increase in percentage of women IAS officers in the past four years. “I have been told that in the batches from 2019 to 2022, the percentage of women IAS officers had ranged between 28 per cent to 34 per cent. I am very happy to note that the percentage of women IAS officers has gone as high as 42 per cent for the batch 2023.