Shri PWC Davidar, IAS

“Work life balance is easier said than done.”

Shri PWC Davidar is a retired IAS officer. He served as former Additional Chief Secretary, Transport; Principal Secretary, Information and Technology;  Special Secretary Health and Family Welfare & Director TNHSP, Tamil Nadu; Commissioner, Corporation of Chennai; Commissioner, Corporation of Madurai; District Collector, Vellore; besides several others. His assignments ranged from hard core Administration and Management to that of Public policy formulation and implementation.

In an exclusive interview, Davidar IAS shares with Marie Banu the initiatives he launched during his tenure in Civil Service and his thoughts on work life balance.

What was your inspiration to join Civil Services?

I did my schooling at Madras Christian College High School; Under Graduate Degree in Commerce and Master’s degree in Public Administration at Madras Christian College in Tambaram, Chennai. While at MCC, I had a lot of exposure. We had a leprosy clinic, blood donation campaigns, and several activities that helped us look at life ahead. The institution gave a lot of importance for extracurricular activities which broad based my learning here. After a short break, I worked as an Asst Professor at MCC for nearly five years teaching Political Science.

Right from my college days, I wanted to be involved in making an impact on people who are less privileged. Although there are several thousands of NGOs, I wanted to do my bit.  As part of my Master’s degree, I did a project on the Block Development Office, Padappai. That’s when I realized the kind of influence and position a District Collector had. This triggered my interest in Civil Services and on exploring I found that IAS had a huge influence on developmental matters. I realised that government service would help me go a long way in fulfilling my desire to serve the needy and I spent a lot of time preparing for the civil service examination.

You were instrumental in deriving the state level government policy for organ donation. Tell us about this.

Yes, and there is a small story to that. There was a girl whom I met in a get-together in 2002. She was suffering from liver and kidney disease and needed a ‘double’ transplant – both liver and kidney. I had no exposure to organ transplant issues until then. When she asked for help, I contacted the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital in Chennai. The hospital found a patient who was brain dead and the family was willing to donate his organs. But, the tissue match was not satisfactory and the organs harvested in Government General Hospital were transplanted in few patients who were admitted in other  hospitals.

This triggered a  bit of controversy at the department. I realized that there was no policy framework to facilitate the organ transplant process – from government hospitals to private hospitals and vice-versa – as the entire hospital sector existed in silos. The systems were not in place with regard to declaration of brain dead and sharing of organs from deceased donors.

I began to get more interested in this issue, and I did obtain information from other countries on their organ transplant policies and processes. The best part was to be able to connect to the MOHAN foundation that had been struggling with this issue for over 10 years  and the NNOS which was also involved in developing public policy in this space.

In 2006, when I was posted in the Health Department, Mr. Subburaj (Health Secretary) and the Chief Minister’s office encouraged me to look deeper into this issue.  A very fair and transparent system was derived after a lot of consultations with government and private transplant hospitals.  You can see that from 2008, a lot of Government Orders were issued regarding organ donation. We then received a lot of enquiries and delegations from other States to understand the systems that we followed. Foreign teams have also visited Chennai to understand how to develop such a program.

I enjoyed working with MOHAN Foundation and NNOS who were motivated and interested as they covered up with a lot of expertise that was required. Even today, I continue to be involved with Mohan Foundation and support them for the work they do. I am happy to note that Tamil Nadu is the number one state cadaver organ donation in the country and continues to play a guiding role to States that want to have a sustainable program. Today, other states are also pushing ahead and making organ donation happen.

Can you share your achievements while serving at Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu?

I did two stints in this portfolio; the first one in 1994-1995 was exciting as I was asked to locate space and set four stadiums in place for the  South Asian games 1995.  I had to do a tender from scratch for four stadiums, Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium, the Mayor Radhakrishnan Hockey Stadium, SDAT Tennis stadium and the Aquatic complex in Velacherry and get the work completed within a span of less than a year. 

During my second stint in 2000, where I remained for four years, I promoted a lot of public-private partnerships like the Squash academy, Dolphin swimming academy and the Table Tennis Academy which  have produced results on a national level. 

Your views on how to handle issues related to Violence against women?

Violence against women is due to several reasons. If you look at someone who has a history of beating his wife, invariably you will find that there are deep issues within the man where he has sold himself out completely to the deep end. He needs to set himself right. He needs help to resolve the garbage in his system and only then can he recognize and treat his wife normally and not look at her as an object or commodity.  You can’t resolve the issue by just working on the psychological makeup of the man.

I believe that any man who indulges in violence against women – his wife or anyone in the opposite sex – has  problem with his sense of identity. I believe that in order to address this fundamental psychological problem, he has to undergo counseling and therapy. Most of all, I believe that man and woman are made in the image of God and we need to understand and respect that. This will definitely lead us to saying ‘No’ to violence against women.

About work-life balance and your advice for parents?

Work-life balance is to recognise that one needs to work to sustain the family and fulfil life’s ambitions while at the same time not getting carried away with the periodic push of adrenalin to be seen as an achiever at the cost of the family.

Work life balance is easier said than done. When you start your career, you are kind of pushing very hard. Promotions depend on how you work and you can’t be strict on your timings. To add to that, the time you spend on social media and other distractions is a challenge.

My wife is a psychiatrist and does a lot of counseling. We are now married for over 30 years and are conducting marriage enrichment seminars for the last 20 years. We have three sons, who are now grown up. Our older son works in Daimler as Senior Manager in the Supply Chain Department and is married to a fashion designer.  The second son is a doctor and works at SIMS at Vadapalani in Chennai and the younger son is handling content partnerships  for YouTube in Tamil Nadu. We spent a lot of time with them while they grew up although both of us were busy in our own profession.  We also made sure that at every given point in time our children never felt neglected. We have done a lot of traveling together and spend a lot of time in together in prayer.

There are formative years, when the children are young and need a lot of emotional and other forms of support. Being unavailable at such times can lead to irreparable damage and bring in a permanent gulf between you and the children. Bridging that gap is difficult. You will need to determine the length to which you want your career or business to grow at the cost of time spent with your spouse and both of you with your children.

As the children grow up into their final years in school or college they will be more independent and will come to you only if they have the confidence that you mean well for them. That belief is built in their minds in the formative years. We have to choose what we really want and not feel pushed by the waves or work pressure.