On my first day as the Block Development Officer (BDO) of Mylliem, Meghalaya, in the June of 2023, I shook more palms and muttered more Khublei(s) (“thank you” in Khasi) in a single day than ever before. The post of a BDO is one of the independent charges that a probationer of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) is given. A Block is a district sub-division made for rural development. It is the cutting edge of administration, the rung of governance that’s the closest to the people.
Sipping my fifth cup of tea after having met the office staff, local headmen and many other stakeholders, I mused, “Okay, 2 months of implementing the schemes I’d studied as a UPSC CSE aspirant — should be fun!”