Revision summary
Integrity is word-deed unity and no second books; necessary, not sufficient without constitutional morality. Impartiality is equal treatment; lawful equity is not a party ledger. Objectivity is evidence and speaking orders bound to constitutional values, not emptiness. Non-partisanship is Conduct-Rules neutrality: no faction’s officer, yet lawful policy is still implemented. The four fail if split: honest bigotry, equal ignorance, clever partisanship, or polite capture.
Model answer
Introduction
Civil service is a trust that outlives a ministry. Integrity, impartiality, objectivity, and non-partisanship are not four posters. They are the inner law that makes a file a public act rather than a private weapon. Each is relevant every day in Uttar Pradesh’s counters; each also has a limit that evaluation must name.
Body
(a) Integrity
- Integrity is the unity of the person and the office: no second set of books, no gift that buys a noting, no private deal in a public lease.
- Nolan and the Second ARC place it first because without it the other three become acting.
- Relevance: procurement, transfers, exam integrity, and the temptation of a “settlement” in a land file.
- Evaluation: integrity is necessary but not sufficient; an honest bigot can still wreck Article 14. It must be paired with constitutional morality.
- It is tested when no camera is on — a night FIR, a relative’s mining truck.
(b) Impartiality
- Impartiality is equal treatment of persons similarly placed: no caste, faith, kin, or donor colour on the counter.
- Relevance: riot relief lists, school admissions, police bail memos, and caste-certificate desks in a polarised district.
- Evaluation: perfect identity-blindness can hide real inequality; equitable impartiality may need a lawful classification (EWS, disability) without becoming a party ledger.
- Recusal is the operational form when kinship or prior enmity would stain the order.
(c) Objectivity
- Objectivity is deciding on evidence, reasons, and the record, not on rumour, astrologer, or the morning’s headline.
- Relevance: inquiry reports, disaster death counts, tender evaluation, and a communal CCTV clip.
- Evaluation: complete neutrality of values is a myth; the civil servant is bound to the Constitution’s values. Objectivity means those values applied to facts, not a god’s-eye emptiness.
- A speaking order is the public face of objectivity; a blank “rejected” is its death.
(d) Non-partisanship
- Non-partisanship is refusing to become a faction’s officer: no campaign work, no social-media war for a party, no slow-walking a file because the applicant voted the other way.
- Conduct Rules already bind AIS and CCS officers to political neutrality.
- Relevance: election machinery, transfers before polls, and the pressure to sit on a dais.
- Evaluation: non-partisanship is not mindlessness about politics. An officer must understand political direction of a lawful policy and still refuse illegal oral partisan use of the police.
- After a change of government, the same file must be defensible; that is the test.
How the four work together
- Integrity without impartiality is honest communalism.
- Impartiality without objectivity is equal ignorance.
- Objectivity without non-partisanship becomes a clever brief for the ruling faction.
- Non-partisanship without integrity is a polite salesman of whoever is in power.
Relevance in one line of practice
- Write reasons, publish where the law allows, recuse, refuse the dais, and treat a minister’s lawful policy as a mandate and an unlawful whisper as a non-event.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD I[Integrity] --> T[Public trust] P[Impartiality] --> T O[Objectivity] --> T N[Non-partisanship] --> T T --> F[Defensible file]
Conclusion
All four remain the civil service’s licence to exercise power in a democracy. Integrity keeps the hand clean; impartiality keeps the scale even; objectivity keeps the record honest; non-partisanship keeps the office from becoming a booth. Evaluated fairly, none is a slogan, and none works alone.
Quick related
Students also ask
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“Attitudes are the result of our experiences.” Explain and evaluate the factors responsible for attitude formation in the context of this statement.
Next question in the 2018 paper (Q19). View answer →
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Can an officer have a private party preference?
A private vote is a citizen’s right. Using the office, the handle, or the police for that preference is the breach of non-partisanship.
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Is objectivity the same as having no values?
No. The civil servant’s values are constitutional. Objectivity is applying them to facts without a communal or donor thumb on the scale.
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