Lucknow: Rinku Singh Rahi, a 2022-batch IAS officer whose life story reads like a testament to unbreakable integrity, has resigned from the Indian Administrative Service. In a move that has sent shockwaves through the bureaucratic corridors of Uttar Pradesh, Rahi stepped down on Tuesday, not because of a scandal, but because the “system refused to let him work”.
Calling his resignation a “moral decision,” Rahi criticised administrative culture that sidelined him. He argued that being kept in an “attached” position, drawing a full salary while being denied any meaningful public service, is a systemic punishment reserved for the honest.
“Corruption in the form of a salary”
Rahi had been stationed at the Uttar Pradesh Revenue Board in Lucknow since July last year, essentially in professional exile. “There is perhaps a special kind of punishment reserved for honest types of people, they get paid, but no work is assigned to them,” Rahi told reporters.
In a powerful indictment of the status quo, he questioned how an officer of integrity could justify receiving a taxpayer-funded paycheck without performing duty. “How can receiving a salary without performing any work be justified under the values of integrity? This, too, is a form of corruption,” he mentioned.
The 36-hour SDM and the “sit-up” controversy
The beginning of the end for Rahi’s tenure began on July 28, 2023, when he was appointed SDM of Puwayan in Shahjahanpur. His term lasted a mere 36 hours. During a routine inspection, Rahi caught an advocate’s clerk urinating against a wall and made him perform sit-ups. When local lawyers protested the lack of functional toilets and poor sanitation, Rahi did something unprecedented. He took moral responsibility as the senior-most officer and performed five sit-ups in front of the protesters as an act of public accountability.
A video of the gesture went viral, drawing praise from the public but ire from the state government. He was swiftly removed from his post and moved to the “attached” list at the Revenue Board, where he remained until his resignation.
A legacy of blood and bravery
Rahi’s commitment to honesty has nearly cost him his life. In 2009, while serving as a 2008-batch PCS officer in Muzaffarnagar, he unmasked a massive scholarship and pension scam valued at over Rs 80 crore. Shortly after, while playing badminton at his residence, he was shot seven times.
The attack left him permanently disfigured, blind in one eye, and hearing-impaired. Despite being hospitalised for four months and facing a system that refused to even clear his medical leave, Rahi refused to back down. He later remarked that regardless of which political party was in power, he found the system consistently opposed to anti-corruption efforts, claiming he was even once sent to a psychiatry department for speaking out. “No government is different… all are the same for me,” he said.
“During the course of my ordeal, I was not fighting the system, but the system was opposing me. I was hospitalised for four months, but my medical leave was not cleared,” Rahi told local reporters.
He never lost his courage
Rahi’s journey to the IAS was fueled by the very students he taught. While serving as the head of a state-run coaching center for civil services, his students encouraged him to take the UPSC exam. At the age of 40, utilizing age relaxation provisions for his disabilities, Rahi secured the 683rd rank in the 2021 examination, transitioning from a PCS officer to the IAS.
His father, Shivdan Singh, a man of modest means from the Hathras/Aligarh region, defended his son’s decision on Tuesday. “He is a patriot and an honest man,” Singh said, recounting how his son studied in government schools and earned his way to a B.Tech degree before entering service. “He lost his eye and his jaw, but he never lost his courage. Now, he is simply not allowed to work.”