Narendra Modi government hands Indian bureaucrats Sir Alex Ferguson autobiographies as motivational tool

The Narendra Modi Government is using Sir Alex Ferguson as a motivational figure

The newly formed Narendra Modi-led BJP Government in India is taking help from an unlikely source to motivate its largely sluggish bureaucrats.Piyush Goel, India’s new minister of Power, Coal and Renewable Energy and a Manchester United fan has handed more than 300 Civil servants Sir Alex Ferguson’s book ‘My Autobiography’ in a bid to shake them up.

"It is time to move beyond politics to performance, and that it is necessary to break barriers within the system,"

"We will have to look at ourselves as truly public servants by sending across a message of clarity, transparency and togetherness to the public to change the image of the government and 'babu log', as people address officers." Mr Goel told the officers.

He also believes that the three combined ministries can contribute to increasing India’s growth-rate by as much as 2%.

Mr Goel’s spokesman, Rajesh Malhotra, said the event was a team building exercise and was aimed at making the officers fro the 3 ministries work together as a team.

“Sir Alex Ferguson is one of [football’s] finest strategists, who groomed his team to take on the biggest challenges and emerge victorious. His autobiography is certainly a masterpiece and it can motivate the officials to move at a fast pace and work as a team,” he said.

When asked if the bureaucrats will now resort to the infamous ‘hairdryer treatment’ for employees who fail to do their work, he replied “Oh no, the minister would never want the civil servants to be rude. He just wants them to work as a team,” .

Sir Alex Ferguson retired from football management at the end of the 2012-13 season after having spent 27 years as Manchester United boss, winning an unprecedented haul of 49 major trophies.