Former Water Secretary and Sanitation Specialist Parameswaran Iyer and former Chief Election Commissioner and Writer SY Quraishi sat down with Kaveree Bamzai to discuss their experiences in the IAS and why young people today should opt for the IAS as a career, during the ThinkEdu Conclave 2021.
Quraishi says that the IAS is a unique institution and an extremely important service, "An IAS officer has to always be on their feet. There is no substitute to grassroot work. My grassroot-level work helped me while I worked at the World Bank," he said.
On what advice they would give to aspiring IAS officers, Iyer said that it was a fascinating career and one has the opportunity to make an impact on the ground and that no other profession offers that opportunity.
"Every officer goes through a remarkable journey and they transform the lives of people on the ground," he said. Quraishi added that after all these years, he would still choose the profession over anything else.