I was reading "The Steel Frame" by Deepak Gupta Sir, on a lookout for some civil services vocabulary. Read one chapter and in that one small section dealing with Indians who chose to join the ICS stood out for me. It so beautifully captures the dualities an Indian would face joining the imperial service at the height of the nationalist movement.
When faced with the question "Why IAS?" all of us can give some rational explanation but there are so many inconsistencies and unresolved dilemmas associated with the decision which only the heart knows. Reading about these other aspirants situated centuries apart was weirdly relatable.
Notably, RC Dutt describing the exam as "this difficult undertaking" that involves "recklessly staking everything on an almost impossible success." KPS Menon says, about his days at Oxford: “We made vehement speeches which we thought patriotic and which the British thought seditious. At the same time, we went on studiously preparing for the ICS. The inconsistency… did not strike us!” Even Nehru was drawn by the glamour of the ICS in his days studying in England.
The exam was the Mount Everest of bright and meritorious students’ ambitions then,
as it is now.
