Every now and then, social media erupts into a shared recollection of some old story, a forgotten memory or simply a private experience someone suddenly decided to make public.So it was today with government officers and observers of the Indian bureaucratic system reflecting on the British legacy of white towels, coloured inks and sizes of tables — all set apart as per a pre-defined and strict hierarchy.The debate began with Ketan, an IIT Delhi alumnus and author of ‘Indian Economy Handbook’, expressing surprise over how government offices across India still retain the British tradition of white towel-adorned chairs for babus.”Walk into any government office in India, towels are a common sight on the chairs of bureaucrats. A ubiquitous symbol of power. Such is the importance of the towel that a few years ago in Uttar Pradesh, lawmakers filed complaints, aggrieved at not being offered chairs draped in white towels during visits to government offices, while pointing out that officers were “sitting on tall, towel-adorned chairs,” Ketan wrote.The matter, he says, was serious enough for the state’s parliamentary affairs department to issue a formal directive to officials, reminding them of the existing hierarchy.”The government ordered that MPs, MLAs and MLCs be given towel-adorned chairs ‘of the same height and decor’ at meetings across the state. In the Uttar Pradesh secretariat in Lucknow, around 1,000 towels are changed twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays,” he said.The post prompted Gurdeep Singh Sappal, formerly OSD with Vice President Hamid Ansari during his two terms in office, to share his knowledge about the subject.Sappal took the debate forward and said the British-era heirarchies which exist even today extend to inks used for making file notings and also to the sizes of tables earmarked for officers of defined ranks in the system.On white towels, Sappal shared his research saying these are a legacy of the British era, when there were few roads, fewer cars and no ACs, officers toured on horses and towels were an integral part of hygiene routine.”British left, horses were sent away, but towels stayed…It’s not just towels, the size of tables and colour of ink are also defined by hierarchy,” Sappal said.He shared his experiences from the time when he was the Joint Secretary with the Vice President.”I had to fight a stiff battle of sorts to order a smaller table that would fit better in my office. The system would not approve of a smaller table!Regarding the colour of ink to be used for noting and signature, Arun Shourie has written a hilarious memoir as minister.In 1999, two officers in the Ministry of Steel made notings on files using red and green ink. This raised a furore as they were junior officers. The seniors were scandalised and an inquiry was initiated,” Sappal says.What happened next was interesting. The India’s bureaucracy spent 13 months debating which colour ink officers could use on files. The Ministry of Steel wrote to the Department of Administrative Reforms which referred the issue to the Directorate of Printing which has ink experts. Printing referred the matter to the Department of Personnel & Training, which told Printing: “It’s your manual, you decide.”Sappal says even the National Archives was consulted for the longevity of ink colours and Ministry of Defence on Army ink hierarchy.After 13 months this was decided — juniors wrote in blue-black or blue ink, because that has the longest life of impression.”The practice is rooted in the British era when files had to travel to Britain, so juniors would write in ink that would stay the longest. The top brass would sign in green and red,” Sappal says.After the probe by ministries, two new paras were added to the manual of office procedure to settle the confusion once and for all.Para 32(9) said only officers of Joint Secretary level and above may use red or green ink, and that too only in rare cases.Para 68(5), however, does not limit the use of these colours to any particular rank (as modern ball pen ink has no issues of shelf life for any colour).”The white towel on the officer’s chair. The red telephone on the desk. The peon standing at the door. The green ink is reserved for the senior sahib. These are not accidents of history. They are architecture, the physical grammar of a bureaucratic culture that worships hierarchy,” says Sappal, igniting an interesting online debate at a time when the government is engaged in erasing all remnants of the British raj.But will Indian babus abandon the British legacy that advances their comforts and hierarchies? That is the real question.