An Interview with Mr. Anil Swarup
Former Secretary, Ministry of Coal & Ministry of School Education and Literacy, Government of India
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Mr. Anil Swarup is a former Secretary to the Government of India, having served in both the Ministry of Coal and the Ministry of School Education and Literacy. Over his career, he has held several senior administrative positions, including the Additional Secretary in the Cabinet Secretariat, the Director General in the Ministry of Labour and Employment, the Export Commissioner in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, and the District Magistrate of Lakhimpur Kheri.
He is the Founding Chairman of the Nexus of Good, an initiative that promotes constructive change and ethical leadership in public service. Mr. Swarup is also the author of three acclaimed books: Ethical Dilemmas of a Civil Servant, Not Just a Civil Servant, and No More a Civil Servant, that draw on his rich administrative experience to offer reflections on governance, integrity, and institutional reform.
In this conversation with Mr. Anil Swarup, The Policy Edge team discusses the opportunities and challenges of working in different institutional settings, the mechanics of navigating complex situations with integrity, and the means of cultivating ethical initiatives when faced with limited autonomy.
In Ethical Dilemmas of a Civil Servant, you reflect on moments where doing the right thing was anything but straightforward within institutional settings. Looking back, is there a particular decision, perhaps from your time in coal, education, or district administration, where standing by your principles meant navigating significant institutional or personal constraints? How did that experience shape your understanding of what it takes to work with integrity from within the system?
In the services, I discovered early that honesty alone isn’t enough. You also need the courage to act, the ability to navigate within the rules, and the wisdom to pick your battles. One such test came during my time in the coal ministry, after the Supreme Court’s cancellation of 204 coal block allocations. There was enormous pressure from all sides to speed up the reallocation. Shortcuts were suggested, but I knew the ministry’s credibility was on trial.
That’s why I pushed for an e-auction system, making the process transparent, competitive, and above board. It wasn’t the easiest route; it slowed a few things down and upset powerful interests. But ethics isn’t about grandstanding; it’s about designing processes that make wrongdoing harder in the first place.
This experience taught me that if integrity is to last, it has to be built into the system; not just depend on individuals. Robust processes, like e-auctions, can make unethical behaviour much harder and build trust over time.
You must push for transparent systems, resist the temptation of shortcuts, and know how to work within the rules while standing firm on your principles. Choosing your battles wisely and creating safeguards in the system is key to protecting both yourself and the public interest over time.
Following on from your response, you led major institutional reforms after the Supreme Court’s 2014 cancellation of coal block allocations. In such a high-stakes environment, what were the key challenges in coordinating across agencies and maintaining procedural efficiency?
The cancellation created a crisis: power plants were at risk, industries were worried, and the media was watching every move. The toughest part was coordination; central ministries, state governments, PSUs, and private players, all had different stakes. Left to itself, the bureaucratic process would have dragged on for years.
To manage this, we created what I called a “war room” in the ministry: a single-window coordination set-up with structured weekly meetings. Everyone involved, from the ministry to state governments, sat around the same table. We put every decision on record, made the process fully transparent, and stuck to clear timelines. The result was auctions completed in record time with minimal litigation. This proved to me that even in a crisis, speed and integrity can go hand in hand, if you build trust and clarity into the system.
This experience illustrates how critical inter-agency coordination mechanisms can be under pressure, and what organisational principles enable such success. The lesson is simple: bring all stakeholders together, keep communication open and documented, and don’t let bureaucratic inertia stall progress. Leading solution-focused meetings, setting deadlines, and maintaining transparency can transform potential chaos into effective action - even when stakes are high.
As the Secretary of School Education and Literacy, how did you work to align systemic reforms with ground realities, such as capacity gaps in local institutions, resistance to change, and uneven political and administrative attention to education? Were there specific mechanisms that helped bridge this implementation divide?
Moving from coal to school education felt like shifting from the visible to the invisible. In coal, the problems were tangible like illegal mining, mafias, and shortages. In education, obstacles were subtler: untrained teachers, patchy infrastructure, resistance to change, and varying political will across states.
I travelled extensively, meeting district officials, teachers, and students to understand the field better. We designed reforms that were simple to implement, easy to monitor, and directly relevant to classrooms - like learning outcome-based assessments and digital school monitoring. Initiatives such as the District Education Transformation Program gave ownership to states and districts, because no central policy can succeed without their buy-in.
The key lesson was that frontline workers i.e. teachers, local officers shape real outcomes. For anyone studying public administration, it is a reminder of how decentralisation and accountability, supported by digital tools, can make reform work. The clear guidance is: before pushing reforms, spend time in the field, listen to those who will implement your policies, and design solutions they can realistically carry out. Real change happens not in distant offices, but in classrooms and communities
Drawing on your books and work across diverse ministries and levels of government, how can a culture of ethical initiative be fostered within the services - especially when officers often work with limited autonomy and few institutional incentives for risk-taking and innovation?
Most officers want to do good work, but the system often discourages initiative. If you try something new and it doesn’t work, you risk a penalty; if you play it safe, nothing happens to you. Over time, this breeds risk-aversion.
I believe fostering a culture of ethical initiative needs three things: visible support from leadership, solidarity among peers, and transparent processes. When I stood by a colleague during the coal investigations, it was because I felt that upright officers must know he won’t be abandoned. Within the service, the next best thing is to create an environment where officers feel secure enough to act on their convictions. Ethics is not about occasional heroics; it’s about making principled action the everyday habit of the institution.
This points to the importance of organizational culture and incentive structures in public administration. Leadership styles, peer networks, and clear institutional protections all shape whether officers take ethical risks or shy away. The reality is that new ideas may bring criticism or setbacks. That’s why it’s important to find allies, work transparently, and help build systems that protect integrity so that doing the right thing becomes the norm, not the exception.
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