'The Kerala Club: Keepers of the Flame', edited by KM Chandrasekhar and TP Sreenivasan, is an unintended book that offers great delight and learning. What began as a casual WhatsApp group of retired civil servants—Kerala cadre officers, Keralites in other cadres or the Ministry of External Affairs or the United Nations, and non-Malayalis who embraced Kerala during postings—evolved into this absorbing compilation.
From WhatsApp to a Published Volume
The WhatsApp group thrived with vibrant recollections of bureaucrats, some of whom helped steer India's sectoral destiny. Chandrasekhar, Union Cabinet Secretary for four years under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, proposed curating these reminiscences by inviting authors to expand their instant messages into full-fledged articles. The book contains 29 chapters, each vastly different, lending variety to the volume.
The editors claim 'The Kerala Club' is “the first attempt of its kind to analyse the Kerala experience of development diligently, honestly and with great attention to detail.” While difficult to verify conclusively, the book stands as a unique narrative about governance experiences.
Literary Flourish and Personal Touch
Co-editor TP Sreenivasan’s anonymous literary flourish is evident in phrases such as describing the book as a “beautiful tapestry — much like a kasavu (roughly zari for non-Malayalis) handloom fabric, meticulously woven with a delicate gold border.” The reviewer, KP Nayar, notes personal familiarity with Sreenivasan’s editing abilities from college, where Sreenivasan taught English language and literature, including phonetics, before joining the Indian Foreign Service in 1967.
Lessons in Governance: Balagopal’s Anganwadi Reforms
The book offers lessons from governance experiences, many relevant to Kerala’s current challenges. Gopalan Balagopal, an IAS officer of the West Bengal cadre who later served as UNICEF Country Head in North Korea after postings in Dhaka, Geneva, and New York, now lives in Wayanad, Kerala. He uses his UNICEF experience to transform anganwadis. He found that a common problem was “administrative data collection, which often discourages honest and accurate recording when the responsibility of data collection and implementation lies with the same individuals.” The anganwadi establishment welcomed his interventions, and improvements came from his nationwide resources and global connections.
Nandakumar’s Battle with Corruption in Bihar
T Nandakumar, a Malayali IAS officer of the Bihar/Jharkhand cadre, faced a different challenge. In 1976, he was made liquidator of the Patna Urban Cooperative Bank, plagued by embezzlement. One loan had a borrower pledging Patna’s Gandhi Maidan and railway station platform no. 1 as collateral. The bank’s chairman, a ruling party MLA, fled but resurfaced when part of his house was attached. A hotel owned by the bank’s secretary was also attached. The MLA’s supporters provoked unrest, but Nandakumar’s team recovered enough to pay back every individual depositor. “The Chief Minister was furious, but held his silence… And I am alive to tell the story. In Bihar, that felt miraculous,” Nandakumar recounts.
Community Policing: Sandhya’s 12-Year Effort
IPS officer B Sandhya’s 12-year experience as nodal officer for the Kerala government’s Community Policing Project raises hopes for restoring confidence in law enforcement, which has reached a nadir in some metros like Delhi and Kolkata. Sandhya cites the Saanjh Model of Punjab Police as a successful example of community policing.
Value for Students and Citizens
A copy of 'The Kerala Club' is well worth its cover price for students aspiring to join the civil service, citizens wanting to understand the corrupt politician-bureaucrat nexus, and lay readers who enjoy the anecdotes peppered throughout its pages.
