Adil Lateef
SRINAGAR, July 21: Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has taken a dig at Human Resources Management (HRM) wing of Public Health Engineering (PHE) Department for its failure to regulate promotions, constitution of Departmental Promotional Committees (DPCs) and seniority lists despite of the fact that the exclusive wing was created for the purpose of the streamlining the Human Resources Development (HRD) functions.
In its latest report that was presented in Jammu and Kashmir Legislature recently, the CAG stated that Human Resources Development functions had not been streamlined despite creation of Human Resources Management wing in the department. “Promotions were made in excess of notified posts and promotees continued to work beyond six months without regularization. There was no regularity in constitution of Departmental Promotion Committees, updating/ finalization of seniority lists and control on engagement of daily rated workers (DRWs)/ community participation workers (CPWs),” it stated.
With a view to streamlining the personnel, vigilance and human resource development functions in the departments, Government created (April 2011) a Human Resources Management (HRM) branch in the PHE department to deal with personal matters of State cadre employees insofar as they relate to promotions, seniority lists, Annual Performance Reports, departmental enquiries, vigilance cases and also to maintain oversight of similar records at levels one below the State cadre.
“HRM branch was also to computerize the personnel records in a specified time frame. For ensuring the objectives, the officers/ officials working in HRM branch had to undergo special capacity building programmes on personal matters and disciplinary cases,” the CAG said, adding: “check of records revealed that HRM branch had finalized (2012 to 2016) seniority lists of SEs, EEs, AEEs, and JEs but had not updated these lists. It had not carried out its responsibilities fully as mandated thereby defeating the purpose of streamlining the Human Resource Development functions of the Department. No activity related to periodic review of HRM was ever attempted by the department.”
The CAG stated that in the absence of constitution of Departmental Promotion Committee (DPCs) on a regular basis, the department continued promotion of gazetted cadre on incharge basis bypassing HRM branch and requirement of obtaining no objection certificate/ vigilance clearance which was a necessity for regular promotions. The working of gazetted cadre on in-charge basis on sensitive posts resulted in the department functioning with adhoc cadre and deprived it of having a regular cadre of officers, it found.
Furthermore, the CAG revealed that there was no transparency in issue of promotion/ regularization orders of various cadres as JEs (diploma holder), Head Assistants, Junior Assistants, Drillers, etc. falling in seniority list at higher place had been overlooked for promotion/ regularization. “Check of records brought out that no updated/ finalized seniority lists of CEs, SEs and AEs cadres had been prepared. Seniority lists of EEs and AEEs issued in 2013 had not been updated,” it said.
The CAG stated that CE, PHE Kashmir had issued (December 2015) updated tentative seniority list of ministerial staff and the same was published in the newspaper for inviting objections on senior list. Audit observed that around 20 employees had filed objections regarding their position or, otherwise, in the tentative seniority list. “No action had been taken to address these objections and finalize seniority list (April 2016). In the absence of finalization of seniority lists, promotions continued to be made on the basis of tentative seniority lists,” it said.
Audit found that Gazetted staff viz CEs, SEs, EEs, AEEs and AEs who were required to furnish appraisal reports annually to HRM branch had not submitted the same on regular basis. “In the test-checked divisions appraisal reports were not being obtained from the field staff and in respect of ministerial staff these were obtained at the time of constitution of DPCs only. Thus, department was unable to assess performance of staff and provide them appropriate feedback and guidance for correcting his deficiencies in timely manner,” the CAG said.
The CAG observed that against sanctioned staff strength of 23,941 under various categories, the effective staff strength was 19,233. “Although, there was overall shortage of 20 per cent of the sanctioned strength, shortage of staff was more in the cadres of Assistant Engineers (AEs) (19 per cent), Junior Assistants (49 per cent) and other categories (20 per cent) which were mainly field staff.
“In addition, 32,067 (Kashmir: 11,615; Jammu: 20,452) casual/ seasonal labourers engaged as daily rated workers (DRW)/ need based workers (NBW)/ community participation workers (CPW) work in divisional offices and field also. The non-regular persons were 167 per cent of the regular staff,” it said.
The CAG said that the staff cost (salary) increased by about 43 per cent from Rs 541.60 crore in 2011-12 to Rs 774.20 crore in 2015-16. “The increase was mainly due to new appointments, increase in dearness allowance, routine increments as well as increments on account of promotions and release of wages,” it added.
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