Govt issues fresh directions, spells out procedure for district/divisional officers

Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Aug 20: Old habits die-hard! This adage is well suited in case of large number of district and divisional officers as they have been leaving their headquarters without the prior permission/knowledge of the Divisional Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners despite repeated circular instructions from the Government. But, now they will have to mend their ways as the General Administration Department on the instructions of Chief Minister, Omar Abdullah and Chief Secretary, Mohammad Iqbal Khandey has clearly spelt out the procedure required to be adopted by these officers before leaving their respective stations.
Official sources told the EXCELSIOR that vide Circular No.741-GAD dated September 3, 1993, the Government had made it clear that all the departments in the districts will be under the administrative and functional control of the respective District Development Commissioners/Deputy Commissioners, who will exercise major powers of Head of Department for all the departments in their jurisdictions.
Similarly, in the year 2009 Government again issued a Circular No.4-GAD dated January 13 reiterating instructions to the District Officers and Divisional/State level Heads of the Departments not to leave their headquarters without prior permission of District Development Commissioner/ Divisional Commissioner/ Administrative Secretary concerned.
The objective behind this circular was to ensure accountability and timely response of the administration to the pressing needs of the people besides to make sure that officers concentrate on their works in their areas of jurisdiction. But this circular too met the fate of circular of 1993 on the subject, sources said, adding on one side there was no strict compliance to the circular from the field officers and on the other side those who had to ensure adherence to the directives were found slack in monitoring the implementation of directions.
This invited sharp reaction from the Chief Minister, who while expressing displeasure over the non-compliance of the earlier directions, asked the General Administration Department to see that officers not adhering to the instructions were taken to task. Accordingly, the GAD vide Circular No.01 dated January 8, 2010, conveyed the concern of the Chief Minister to all the Administrative Secretaries, Divisional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners and Heads of the Departments.
Though initially there was strict compliance of the directions in view of Chief Minister’s concern yet later the response of the district and divisional officers started fading prompting the General Administration Department to issue another circular No.19 dated July 16, 2012 reiterating the earlier directions besides fixing touring as well as non-touring days for the district and sectoral officers.
As there was no compliance despite numerous circular instructions from the GAD, some Deputy Commissioners in the recent past wrote to the Chief Secretary mentioning that in the absence of clearly laid down procedure the district officers were frequently leaving the headquarters on one or the other pretext thereby hampering the functioning of the administration, sources said.
Now, on the instructions of Chief Minister and Chief Secretary, General Administration Department has clearly spelt out the procedure to be adopted by the district and divisional officers before leaving the headquarters.
As per the order, district/other officers working in the district shall not leave the headquarters without the prior permission of the concerned Deputy Commissioner/District Development Commissioner while as Deputy Commissioner/District Development Commissioner will not leave the headquarters without the prior permission of the Divisional Commissioner concerned.
The officers of the divisional level will not leave the headquarters without the prior permission of the Divisional Commissioner concerned while as Divisional Commissioner will not leave the headquarters without the prior permission of the Chief Secretary. It has also been directed that the district/divisional administration will closely monitor the attendance of the officers within their respective jurisdiction.

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