CCG urges serving civil servants to uphold Constitution, resist ‘partisan objectives’

The Constitutional Conduct Group (CCG), a collective of former All-India Services officials, on Wednesday (October 7, 2026) urged serving civil servants to uphold the Constitution, alleging that “so many civil servants seem to have surrendered their independence of authority and the discretion accorded to them to allow ‘partisan objectives’ to succeed”.

In an open letter, the CCG said that constitutional values were being “openly breached” and democratic dialogue was “virtually absent, with dissent often being termed ‘anti-national’”. “Over the past decade, the Union government has rarely adopted a process of dialogue and discussion to frame policies or resolve issues,” it said, referring to demonetisation, the Goods & Services Tax, the abrogation of Article 370, the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, the farm laws, the new criminal laws, delimitation of constituencies, and the “NEET fiasco and its aftermath”.

“The most glaring example of wilful disregard of constitutional ethics is that of the present Election Commission of India (ECI) (which currently consists entirely of former IAS officers) bringing about inexplicable changes in electoral registration processes. In introducing the arbitrarily designed SIR, they used their constitutional authority to convert what until then was a routine administrative procedure into a measure designed to exclude and disenfranchise millions of genuine voters for brazenly unconstitutional, partisan, and political ends,” alleged the CCG.

By shifting the onus on citizens to enlist themselves as voters and produce documentary proof of their legitimacy, “overturning the natural presumption of citizenship that existed in their favour”, and introducing lineage as the basis of voting rights, the ECI ensured that the stated purpose of “purification” of the rolls created “panic and fear in large sections of the Indian population”, it said.

“As former colleagues, we find it painful that, apart from the top levels of the ECI, so many civil servants seem to have surrendered their independence of authority and the discretion accorded to them to allow partisan objectives to succeed,” it alleged.

The CCG also alleged that officials of central agencies like the Income-Tax Department, Enforcement Directorate, Central Bureau of Investigation, Narcotics Control Bureau, and the police had been “complicit in the unnecessary harassment of individuals and institutions deemed to be opposed to the government of the day”.

“Cases are registered under provisions of draconian laws like the UAPA, PMLA, and NDPS: investigations are allowed to drag on interminably, with the process of justice itself becoming the punishment, given the ponderous movement of the judicial process and the onerous stipulations for grant of bail,” said the organisation.

Criticising the police response to an attempt by protesters to march from Jantar Mantar to Parliament on July 20, the CCG expressed concern over “senior officials facilitating Kanwar yatras while minority establishments are targeted, alongside communal hate speech, violence, and selective demolitions”.

The CCG also accused the Environment Ministry of “forsaking its regulatory role” and becoming “a facilitator for big industry”. It said environmental clearances had jumped 20-fold between 2018 and 2022, from 577 to over 12,000 in a single year. The letter also pointed to the Great Nicobar project and issues concerning the Aravallis.

“We do not claim a moral high ground or wish to lecture you on the primary allegiance as civil servants that you have to the Constitution of India. We are fully cognisant of the fact that the erosion in strict adherence to Constitutional principles had begun long before the present regime came into power, and then, as now, the spineless outnumbered those who stood up for principles,” it added.