STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: Hailing the notification issued by DoPT, Government of India imposing restrictions on frequent transfers of civil servants, Harsh Dev Singh, Chairman JKNPP and former Minister, today sought strict enforcement of the said new set of rules in J and K State so as to insulate bureaucracy from political interference and to put an end to whimsical transfers of such officers by the political bosses.
Talking to reporters, Harsh said the newly notified India Administrative Service (cadre) second Amendment Rules 2016 requiring the constitution of Civil Services Board at State level for transfer of civil servants and the necessity of recording reasons for pre-mature transfers shall go a long way in ensuring transparency and accountability in the system of governance, if implemented in proper perspective.
He said that it was appreciable that the new rules restrained even the Prime Minister and the Chief Ministers to make pre mature transfers of such Civil Servants without recording in writing the reasons thereof.
He called upon the DoPT to ensure strict compliance of the newly notified policy and to take further cognisance of the most reckless defiance of the transfer norms by the helmsmen in the State of J and K where the mechanism of transfers is plagued by the menace of favoritism, corruption, nepotism, extraneous and other considerations with no regard to individual’s suitability or efficiency for the prescribed job.
Strongly condemning the whole sale pre-mature transfers of officers at various levels in the departments of Forests, Social Welfare, Health besides others, Singh said that RTI reply received by him had revealed several hundreds of pre-mature transfers having been made only at Gazetted levels in the said departments during the year 2015-16 in violation of stipulated norms and the transfer policy announced by the GAD.
He said that several of such transfers of gazette officers in the said departments had been made despite having stay of 2 to 3 months as revealed in the RTI reply.
He further said that simple orders had been issued for such pre mature transfers in all of the said cases without recording reasons for such pre mature transfers as envisaged in the Transfer policy.
He said that besides hundreds of pre mature transfers had been issued at non gazetted level by several officers who had neither the competence nor were the reasons for such transfers recorded in black and white as per the mandate of the Transfer policy.
He further said that non compliance with set guidelines and arbitrariness in the matter had led to highly capricious and politicised transfers with loud whispers of corrupt practices in the said departments necessitating a high level probe.
Questioning the tall claims of the BJP on transparency and accountability, Harsh challenged the loud mouthed dunderheads of the saffron brigade to come out with the reasons for such wholesale pre mature transfers of officers in terms of the transfer policy.
He said that never before had the pre mature transfers of officers been effected on such a large scale as were made during the tenure of incumbent government which totally exposed the hypocrisy and demagoguery of the present rulers.
Calling upon the DoPT, GoI to ensure strict compliance of the new policy enunciated for civil servants, Singh called upon the central BJP leadership to take cognisance of open defiance of transfer policy in J and K which has been torn to tattlers by its own Ministers for their own loaves and fishes.
