Blank sheets likely to be auto-forwarded, treated as default
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Jan 15: Thousands of Gazetted Officers of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir have failed to file Annual Performance Reports (APRs) on the Smart Performance Appraisal Report Recording Online Window (SPARROW) portal within the stipulated time-frame even after the preparation of Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for their assistance by the General Administration Department.
In order to streamline processing of Annual Performance Reports (APRs) for all Gazetted Officers in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, SPARROW, on the analogy of Performance Appraisal Reports of All India Service officers and Jammu and Kashmir Administrative Service officers, was launched by the Chief Secretary Dr Arun Kumar Mehta and the portal was made live for filing of APRs with effect from September 15, 2022.
For filing of APRs on the portal, even e-mail IDs along with passwords were generated and details sent on the mobile numbers linked with Centralized Personnel Information System (CPIS) of all the Gazetted Officers except those of Jammu and Kashmir Administrative Service.
Further, for the purpose of facilitating process, Standard Operating Procedure was prepared and Help Desk consisting of some officers was established in the General Administration Department, Information Technology Department and National Informatics Centre (NIC) for the consultation in case of any difficult while operating the portal. Even blank APRs for the assessment year 2021-22 were generated and forwarded to the officers through the portal.
Moreover, the Information Technology Department conducted extensive trainings of the officers on the subject for smooth transition to new system and uploaded the help videos on the portal for convenience of the filing officers.
However, thousands of Gazetted Officers of different Government departments have failed to file APRs on the SPARROW portal within the stipulated time-frame—December 31, 2022, official sources told EXCELSIOR. They disclosed that a total of 24,000 Gazetted Officers were mapped on the portal and their blank APRs were generated but only 16,000 filed APRs on the SPARROW portal within the stipulated time-frame.
“If the Government doesn’t extend the time-line the blank APRs will get auto-forwarded to the next authority and the same will be treated as default on the part of the Gazetted Officers”, sources said, adding “now the General Administration Department will pin-point the officers who have defaulted in writing the APRs and forward the details to the Chief Secretary for his decision”.
They further said, “the Gazetted Officers should understand that the technological intervention is going to benefit them by bringing more transparency, avoiding loss of appraisal reports during transition, ensuring better monitoring and timely completion of performance appraisals”, adding “the SPARROW system will not only overcome the delay in the processing of the manual recording of APRs but will also facilitate the electronic filing through a user-friendly interface – anywhere, anytime”.
Recording and movement of e-APR forms will be seamless, quick and convenient due to in-built alert mechanisms and online status checks through different modes during the work-flow. The system would streamline the APR life-cycle and would be a major administrative reform.
It is pertinent to mention here that under this system, which is being implemented for the first time, the concerned officer is required to fill self appraisal online for its submission to his/her Reporting Officer. The APR would move from Reporting Officer to Reviewing Officer and finally to the Accepting Authority in a time-bound and seamless manner.
Even the officers who had already submitted physical APRs for the year 2021-22 were directed to compulsorily file their APRs electronically on the SPARROW portal and this indicates that Government is very serious in implementing the system in respect of all the officers.
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