Commonly perceived as corrupt, Indian bureaucracy may soon receive a forced image makeover with the governmnet mulling to make it complusory for babus to list their assets -movable and immovable - on a website. It is even bneing planned to have the bureaucrats update the list annually to relflect any change in assets owned.

The cabinet secretary has called for a meeting of all union secretaries on Tuesday, at the instance of the prime minister, to discuss a possible course for the project as part of the strategy to bring transparency in governance.

The drive will begin with the property details of all IAS and IPS officers being put on the website, and then be extended to cover all 18 pan-Indian civil services within a year, sources privy to government motion say.

Corresponding details of some 1,00 bureaucrats have already been uploaded on to the website, but will be made accesible only after the cabinet secretary's meeting clears the project.

Some senior bureaucrats have, however, protested that their privacy will be intruded upon due to the unrestricted access of all and sundry to their asset details. They say all officers are already required to give these details to the government every year and government scrutiny is enough to nail the corrupt while publicising the details may subject them to unnecessary harassment and questioning.

Around a decade ago, then central vigilance commissioner N Vittal had moved to publicise details of bureaucrats against whom action had been initiated for corruption. But, he had to withdraw the move as bureaucrats registered a strong protest.

Sources say the cabinet secretary has already conducted three meetings to discuss all such issues with the other secretaries and they conceded that the bureaucrats should not conduct themselves like "touch-me-not" when a similar kind of system is in place for those contesting elections.

The consenus at these meetings has been that as public servants bureaucrats are answerable to the citizenry.

The election commission website has carried data on the wealth of candidates in Parliamentary and assembly elections.