(a) Identify five ethical traits on which one can plot the performance of a civil servant. Justify their inclusion in the matrix. (b) Identify ten essential values that are needed to be an effective public servant. Describe the ways and means to prevent non-ethical behaviour in public servants.

(a) Five ethical traits for a performance matrix

• Integrity: the officer’s public file and private ledger match. Plot it because a brilliant liar still wrecks trust; the Second Administrative Reforms Commission treated integrity as the floor of ethics in governance.
• Impartiality: the same rule for kin, party worker and stranger. Plot it because Article 14 fails at the counter if the matrix only counts speed and revenue.
• Empathy: accurate seeing of the person who cannot fill the form. Plot it because intellect without empathy designs a scheme the poorest cannot enter, as many digital-only COVID passes showed.
• Moral courage: written refusal of an illegal oral order. Plot it because a timid ACR-safe officer produces a quiet district and a loud injustice.
• Accountability: a speaking order, a name on a delay, and acceptance of audit. Plot it because opacity is how a nexus hides; the Right to Information Act, 2005 is useless if the officer is never scored for candour.
• Justification of the set: these five are observable in files, field visits and grievance outcomes, not only in a training-week pledge.
• A matrix that scores only expenditure and VIP visits will reward the periphery and punish the honest no.
• How to plot: 360-degree feedback, random file audit, citizen-satisfaction samples weighted toward the weakest ward, and a recorded dissent count that is not treated as indiscipline.
• Limit: a matrix must not become a witch-hunt of dissenters or a tick-box of integrity workshops. Evidence of conduct, not slogans, should move the needle.

(b) Ten essential values and means against non-ethical behaviour

• Integrity, impartiality, objectivity, empathy, compassion, dedication to public service, non-partisanship, honesty in money and speech, courage, and humility before facts.
• These ten make an effective public servant because they convert statute into delivery without a private toll and without a party flag on the file.
• Nolan-type principles of public life name several of the same duties: selflessness, accountability, openness and leadership by example.
• Prevention is not a poster. It is design that makes the unethical path costly and the ethical path possible.
• Law: the Central Civil Services (Conduct) Rules, 1964; the All India Services (Conduct) Rules, 1968; the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 after the 2018 amendments; and asset-declaration regimes that are actually read.
• Transparency: suo motu disclosure under Section 4 of the Right to Information Act, 2005, e-procurement, and public dashboards that a tout cannot rewrite.
• Oversight: Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013; Central Vigilance Commission; Comptroller and Auditor General; social audit as in MGNREGA; and a usable Whistle Blowers Protection Act, 2014.
• Personnel: rotation in sensitive posts, cooling-off, punishment that is real and not a paid holiday transfer, and rewards for a lawful yes rather than for the number of objections.
• Culture: the head of office who refuses a gift, protects a subordinate who recorded dissent, and does not humiliate the messenger.
• Training: case discussion of illegal oral orders, not only marks; counselling and a grievance door so that fear does not become a bribe.
• Technology helps when it removes a discretionary no; it fails when a portal is captured by a Common Service Centre tout.
• Non-ethical behaviour is prevented when the officer expects to be caught, expects to be backed for honesty, and does not need a second income to live.