Pub:
Our nation is run by a combination of elected and permanent executives.
Ministers at the Centre and the State form the elected executives. They rotate every 5 years or as long as they have the support of the legislators.
The permanent executive consists of civil servants. Once inducted into the service, only the President of India can terminate their career.
The first and foremost function of a civil servant is to make sure that the day-to-day government functions irrespective of the political climate at that time.
The second function of the civil service is to assist political executives in formulating their policies and offering non-partisan advice on how to execute them.
The third function of the civil service is to ensure that the government machinery is fully functional and active to execute the formulated policies.
In a nutshell, civil servants run our nation irrespective of who is in power.