Can an IAS officer have a conscience?

Scroll Adda · Oct 10, 2025 · 1h 30m

India has, in theory, a cabinet system of government. A group of popularly elected politicians are meant to rule using consensus.In practice, of course, we have a strongman (or strongwoman) model, where one powerful politician rules via a clique of Indian Administrative Service officers.

So much do politicians like the IAS that since independence, they have given the cadre more and more power. This when, during the Raj itself, babus were already seen to be all-powerful.What happens, though, when an IAS officer decides to listen to his conscience?

In 2019, Kannan Gopinathan resigned from the…