Real World Application
During the Primary Phase of Single Blind Experimentation conducted in March 2019, they denied the administrative custody of the defunct and illegally occupied Patwarkhana situated in Kathera village. Moreover, they falsely implicated another government agency to legalize and conceal their collective negligence as the defunct building was constructed in early 2000s. Afterwards, in the secondary phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation conducted in July 2019, initially they pretended to take immediate necessary action but gave the same evasive response on January 2021, thereby dismissing their own directives and entrapping themselves. By doing so, they also exhausted their threshold limit, as retracting from the repeated official statements became impossible for them. The Tertiary Single-Blind Experimentation triangulated the experimental subjects and created a Prisoner’s Dilemma, which coerced them to admit their fault and they confirmed that the building was in the administrative custody of revenue department and has started functioning on 31 march 2022. However, the post experimental monitoring phase, which lasted more than 2 years, revealed that building is merely functional on paper and is actually defunct. Therefore, the official confirmation provided by the experimental subjects regarding the functioning of Patwarkhana also proved to be false.
This Project revealed that the government revenue department Kathua, despite being highly organized group, has consistently demonstrated inaction and professional misconduct and negligence due to a deteriorating departmental culture stemming from a lack of accountability and supervision. It also revealed that the revenue functionaries are entrenched in a culture of indiscipline, apathy, and nepotism, perpetuated by the lack of effective oversight and the absence of consequences for their wrongdoing. This has led to the normalized culture of unaccountability, where malpractices are tolerated and even institutionalized.
Besides, research also revealed a reversal of the fundamental management principle, where authority flowed downwards, but responsibility did not flow upwards. Instead, responsibility was conspicuously absent, perpetuating a culture of unresponsiveness and reinforcing the need for a management overhaul. Dichotomy observed in their behavior revealed that the group member presents a façade of accountability to the outside world while maintaining a hidden dynamic among themselves by operating on two distinct levels: a public façade of accountability and a private reality of collusion.
Alarmingly, senior officers from the Indian Administrative Services and Jammu and Kashmir Administrative Services, who were expected to uphold the highest standards of conduct, have systematically violated their official conduct and service rules over the past five years, thereby betraying the trust and integrity expected of their positions. Thus, it is naïve to expect rogue officials to submit honest self-performance appraisals that may incriminate themselves. This highlights a critical flaw in the evaluation process, which relies on self-assessment rather than objective metrics or independent evaluations.
It is pertinent to mention here that the organizational work culture is always inherited by the successors. Thus, the consequences of complacency or negligence by incumbents are inherited by successors, who face challenges in publicly criticizing their predecessors due to departmental loyalty and affinity. Over time, predecessors having climbed the career ladder, becomes seniors, making it more difficult for successors to assign blame, as the passage of time limits the scope of accountability.
The persistence of such work culture permeates the vertical and horizontal structure of the department and causes normalization of unhealthy behaviors, reinforcement of harmful norms, difficulty in introducing reforms or changes, and ultimately a steep decline in overall performance and effectiveness. Consequently, public suffers because the public issues remain unresolved thereby diluting the public trust in institutions as the public perceives huge contradictions in the planning and working of the government. This inflicts a “social psychological scar” causes a permanent shift of the public’s psyche.
Such phenomenon does not remain restricts to a particular area and engulfs the entire country in the long-run. Generally, Individuals born and grown up in such society tend to wear a mask of intellectual and moral integrity to gain entry to the powerful positions, aiming to achieve success and security even if it means compromising the well-being of others. Eventually, this leads to the emergence of a society where ulterior motives become the norm and the evolution of a hypocritical social system.
Therefore, the onus of responsibility is on the lawmakers and policy makers to make accountability and performance an integral part of the government services. It is essential to foster the competitive work culture and to ensure the optimum utilization of the resources of the country. To discourage professional misconduct and negligence, there must be no state-sponsored protection or immunity granted to the officers at all levels. Errant functionaries must be relieved immediately without burdening the judiciary. Any delay or complacency in implementing such reforms will cause irreparable damage to the institutions and bring detrimental consequences for the country.
7.0.1 Replication of Research
The detailed methodology and the field work conducted during this research are crucial tools for the research fraternity. They enable us to document the natural behavior of the experimental subjects and can serve as a bait for the researcher. Regardless of the power wielded by the influential subjects, they won’t be able to outsmart the researcher. Their overconfidence will become their collective enemy.
For future researchers, replicating this study would require a considerable investment of time, resources, and serious endeavor coupled with intrinsic motivation to unravel the organizational dynamics. Employing Single-Blind Experimentation is recommended to achieve similar results. However, conducting such original research has potential dangers from the biased deviant subjects, as they may harm the investigator to conceal their corrupt actions. Therefore, due caution and safety must be exercised while carrying out such work.
Moreover, it is essential that the investigator is not a public servant, a research fellow of a publicly funded university, or on a government grant, as these positions are bound to compromise and curtail the independence of the researcher. Faculties in the universities often do not permit such works that could cause any trouble for them in their service or livelihood. This study requires total independence or autonomy to ensure unbiased results.
Additionally, the researcher must be genuinely interested in the public interest and should have an assertive, fearless personality. Besides, he/she/they must have advanced knowledge in public administration, law, geography, politics, social psychology, cartography, and sociology, and be savvy in computer-applications in research.
It must be remembered that the consistency of the results depends upon the role of confounding variables. In the current research, the critical confounding variables are the lack of effective oversight, accountability, and elected government. Research scholars are likely to see similar results if they conduct research with the same methodology in countries with a colonial past, especially in South-East Asia.
7.0.2 Critical Qualitative Data of the Research Project
Figure: 76 Source- Human Rights Pledge Certificate obtained by the Research Practitioner on July 29, 2019
Figure: 77(a) Printed Government Acknowledged Copy of the Tool used in the Primary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Figure: 77(b) Printed Government Acknowledged Copy of the Tool used in the Primary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Figure: 78 Response of the Experimental Subjects during the Primary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Figure: 79 (a) Printed Government Acknowledged Copy of the Tool used in the Secondary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Figure: 79 (b) Printed Government Acknowledged Copy of the Tool used in the Secondary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Important Note
The experimental subjects suppressed the official records depicted in [Figure No. 77(a), 77(b), 79(a), 79(b)] and did not provide the printed and certified copies during the Tertiary Phase of Single-Blind Experimentation. At the same time, the feature to view and download these records was not available on the website interface of the Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell until May 10, 2022. The web screen recording uploaded on YouTube confirms this limitation, and anyone can verify it by clicking on the link https://youtu.be/X0Wd2Sfl1lU However, the website later added this feature, enabling the Research Practitioner to retrieve these documents.
Figure: 80 Response of the Experimental Subjects during the Secondary Phase of the Single-Blind Experimentation Source- Jammu and Kashmir Government Grievance Cell (jkgrievance.in)
Figure: 80(a) Case-Diary Number 10384/IN/2020 obtained from the National Human Rights Commission-New Delhi on July 13, 2020
Figure: 80(b) Case-Diary Number 10384/IN/2020 obtained from the National Human Rights Commission-New Delhi on July 13, 2020
Figure: 80(c) Case-Diary Number 10384/IN/2020 obtained from the National Human Rights Commission-New Delhi on July 13, 2020
Figure: 80(d) Case-Diary Number 10384/IN/2020 obtained from the National Human Rights Commission-New Delhi on July 13, 2020
