Number of IAS officers to go up
DoPT wants UT to hold Cadre Review
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Nov 24: The Central Government has decided to implement 67:33 ratio for allotment of Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officers to the newly created Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir at par with other States and UTs.
The Centre has one again asked the Union Territory Government to hold ‘Cadre Review’ for IAS officers which would increase number of posts of the IAS officers in the UT and help the Government to allocate more direct recruits to Jammu and Kashmir through AGMUT (Arunachal Pradesh Goa Mizoram and Union Territories) cadre from next year.
Union Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), Incharge Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT), Dr Jitendra Singh said that the DoPT has regularly been insisting on Cadre Review. Timely cadre revision gives better Civil Services structure, he added.
Official sources said the DoPT had given repeated reminders to the previous PDP-BJP Government, first headed by late Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and then his daughter Mehbooba Mufti, to hold cadre review for IAS officers to increase strength of the civil services officers in Jammu and Kashmir but they paid no heed to the reminders.
Though the then State Government didn’t give any reasons for not holding Cadre Review while ignoring the DoPT reminders, sources said probably the PDP, which was major coalition partner in the Government, didn’t want more outside IAS officers to come to J&K and had also asked the Centre to stick to formula of 50:50.
The then UPA Government had devised new formula of IAS officers’ allocation for Jammu and Kashmir under which 50 percent of the total strength of officers were allocated by the DoPT after clearing the UPSC while 50 percent local service officers were promoted as the IAS.
This was contrary to 67:33 ratio which was in force for rest of the States in the country as well as AGMUT cadre under which 67 percent Civil Services officers were allocated to the States and UTs by the DoPT after clearing UPSC while 37 percent State service officers were promoted to the IAS.
“The 67:33 formula will now be applicable to the Union Territory through the AGMUT cadre of Jammu and Kashmir shortly through the AGMUT cadre. A formal order in this regard will be issued soon by the DoPT,” sources said.
While the cadre review has to be done by the Government of Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the allocation of civil services officers to J&K from next year will be done through the AGMUT cadre, which is applicable to all nine UTs of the country.
The Central Government, according to sources, was quite confident that the Union Territory Government of Jammu and Kashmir would complete the Cadre Review well in time to facilitate the DoPT to allocate increased number of IAS officers to the UT to improve Civil Services structure.
Presently the website of General Administration Department (GAD) showed total 66 IAS officers in the erstwhile State of Jammu and Kashmir, which has now been bifurcated into two Union Territories of J&K and Ladakh. They included the officers who were on Central deputation, two under trainees and Shah Faesal, who has resigned from the IAS to join politics.
According to sources, it was not only the previous PDP-BJP Government but even before that the National Conference-Congress coalition Government too didn’t hold Cadre Review of the IAS officers for some years resulting into delay in increasing their strength.
“With Cadre Review, the posts of the IAS officers in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir will go up and this could help local youth qualifying the Civil Services exams to get absorbed in their home UT,” sources pointed out.
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