(a) Attitude is an important component that goes as input in the development of human being. How to build a suitable attitude needed for a public servant? (b) In case of crisis of conscience does emotional intelligence help to overcome the same without compromising the ethical or moral stand that you are likely to follow? Critically examine.
Approach · directive: “how / critically examine”
What it asks · (a) Explain how a public servant's attitude can be built and sustained; (b) judge whether emotional intelligence helps resolve a crisis of conscience without giving up one's moral stand.
The question has 2 parts — answer each
- (a) Explain how a suitable attitude for a public servant can be built and sustained
- (b) Critically examine whether emotional intelligence helps overcome a crisis of conscience without compromising one's moral stand: its help, its limits and a verdict
Open with · Aristotle: we become just by doing just acts. Attitude is learned and can be built; emotional intelligence decides whether it holds under pressure.
Cover
- (a) Attitude has cognitive (beliefs), affective (feelings) and behavioural parts; family, education, peers, media and experience shape it, and it can be changed.
- (a) Building it: value-based induction and in-service training, field exposure to the poor and remote areas, case studies and reflective practice.
- (a) Sustaining it: role models and mentors, leadership by example, 360-degree feedback, and rewards for service orientation, empathy and integrity.
- (b) EI helps: self-awareness and self-regulation calm fear and anger, empathy widens the view of stakeholders, and social skills help refuse wrongdoing and find alternatives.
- (b) Limits: EI is a skill, not a value; it can rationalise or manipulate, so moral principles, legal knowledge and courage must anchor it.
- (b) Verdict: EI helps hold one's moral stand under pressure; conscience gives direction and EI the means to act on it.
- Anchors: Aristotle on habit and the right measure of anger; Goleman's five EI components; Gandhi halting Non-Cooperation after Chauri Chaura; Karmayogi's rules-to-roles shift.
Close with · Attitude tells a public servant what is right and emotional intelligence lets her act on it calmly; training must build both.
Add value (verified)
- Mission Karmayogi (Cabinet approval, 2 September 2020) is delivered through the Integrated Government Online Training (iGOT) Karmayogi platform for civil-service capacity building. Cabinet approves "Mission Karmayogi" - National Programme for Civil Services Capacity Building (NPCSCB) — PIB, 2 September 2020 ↗“The Programme will be delivered by setting up an Integrated Government Online Training-iGOTKarmayogi Platform”
- Aristotle: virtues are formed by habit; we become just by doing just acts, temperate by temperate acts and brave by brave acts. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book II (trans. W. D. Ross) — The Internet Classics Archive, MIT ↗“For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them, e.g. men become builders by building and lyreplayers by playing the lyre; so too we become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.”
- Aristotle: anyone can get angry, but to do so to the right person, to the right extent, at the right time, with the right motive and in the right way is not easy. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book II (trans. W. D. Ross) — The Internet Classics Archive, MIT ↗“so, too, any one can get angry- that is easy- or give or spend money; but to do this to the right person, to the right extent, at the right time, with the right motive, and in the right way, that is not for every one, nor is it easy”
- Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence (1995) described five components: self-awareness, self-control, self-motivation, empathy and social skills. Emotional intelligence — Encyclopaedia Britannica ↗“In Emotional Intelligence (1995), a work that served to popularize the notion in the 1990s, the American psychologist Daniel Goleman described emotional intelligence as comprising five broadly understood components: self-awareness, self-control, self-motivation, empathy, and social skills.”
- Mission Karmayogi's guiding principles include a transition from 'Rules based' to 'Roles based' HR management, matching civil servants' competencies to the post. Cabinet approves Mission Karmayogi — PIB, 2 September 2020 ↗“The core guiding principles of the Programme will be: Supporting Transition from 'Rules based' to 'Roles based* HR Management.Aligning work allocation of civil servants by matching their competencies tothe requirements of the post.”
Question: UPSC's CS (Main) 2021, GS Paper IV — paper ↗. Approach: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify) — UPSC publishes no model answers. ·
Model answer · 380 words (UPSC limit 150) · Minimalist IAS
"We become just by doing just acts," wrote Aristotle: character grows from habit. Attitude, a learned readiness to respond to people and situations, can likewise be built, and emotional intelligence decides whether it holds under pressure.
(a) How to build a suitable attitude for a public servant
- Right content: the belief that the citizen is the principal (cognitive), respect and empathy (affective), courtesy and listening (behavioural); service-oriented, not procedure-bound.
- Learning by doing: field attachments in villages, slums and tribal areas, case studies and role-play; habits formed early become attitude.
- Role-based training: Mission Karmayogi (2020) seeks a transition from "Rules based" to "Roles based" HR, matching competencies to the post.
- Role models: seniors who model courtesy and integrity; attitudes are caught more than taught.
- Reinforcement: citizen and 360-degree feedback in appraisals, recognition of empathy, and early correction of arrogance.
- Self-work: reflection, contact with civil society, and a guard against the cynicism that sets in after early postings.
(b) Does emotional intelligence help overcome a crisis of conscience?
- The crisis: an instruction clashes with what one believes right, such as an order to divert relief to a favoured village.
- The toolkit: Daniel Goleman (1995) named five components of emotional intelligence: self-awareness, self-control, self-motivation, empathy and social skills.
- Right measure: Aristotle observed that anyone can get angry, but to do so "to the right person, to the right extent, at the right time" is not easy; emotional intelligence is that measure.
- Exemplar: after the violence at Chauri Chaura in February 1922, Gandhi called off the Non-Cooperation Movement altogether. He halted a mass movement rather than dilute non-violence: composure in action, firmness in principle.
(b) Its limits, and a verdict
- Limits: emotional intelligence is a competence, not a compass. A manipulator can score high on it, and it can dress up compliance as keeping the peace.
- Verdict: it does not decide what is right; conscience, law and values do. It helps carry that decision through calmly, without breaking relationships or the moral stand.
Attitude tells a public servant what is right; emotional intelligence lets her act on it without losing composure. Training should build both, so that conscience is never left alone at the moment of crisis.
Written by Minimalist IAS from facts checked at source (how we verify) — a little fuller than exam length, so every part of the question is covered; in the hall, keep the structure and trim the detail. UPSC publishes no model answers: compare your structure and coverage with this, then write your own.