Panel raps Minority Ministry for not filling up vacant posts
New Delhi: A parliamentary panel has rapped
the Minority Affairs Ministry for its "very poor response" in
filling up vacancies in its organisational set up and asked it
to review selection criteria to ensure that posts do not lie
vacant for long.
The observations were made by the Standing Committee on
Social Justice and Empowerment in its seventh report tabled in
both Houses of Parliament today.
The panel made the charges while responding to the Action
Taken Report of the Government on recommendations of the
committee regarding ministry's demands for grants for the year
2009-10.
The committee had observed that the organisational set up
of the ministry was inadequate and incomplete with a large
number of posts lying vacant and recommended the ministry to
take necessary steps for filling up the posts at the earliest.
The ministry in their action taken reply informed that it
carries a vacancy of nearly 30 per cent in core cadres and
that it did not get enough applications to fill them.
The panel, however, felt the ministry's reply reflects
"very poor response" for filling up the vacancies, which show
that the publicity given to the vacancies has been "limited
and inadequate".
"Ministry should review the selection criteria...and
relax the same wherever possible so that these do not lie
vacant for long," the committee noted.
The panel noted with concern that the Minority Affairs
Ministry does not have data of minority communities living
below poverty line.
It asked the ministry to "closely coordinate with
ministries of Rural Development and Housing and Urban Poverty
Alleviation to ensure inclusion of collection of requisite
data of minority communities living below poverty line and
double below the poverty line in the BPL survey."
The committee also noted with "unhappiness" that the
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Literacy Award, which was given to
institutes doing considerable work to promote education among
minorities, could not be resumed after it was discontinued in
2006.
"The committee are unhappy to note that though the award
has been discontinued from 2005-06 and four years have passed
since it conferment, the ministry and Maulana Azad Education
Foundation are still in the process of devising the parameters
of eligibility criteria.
"The committee feels that remedial action should have
been taken immediately after non-conferment of award in
2005-06 so that it should have been resumed the next year,"
the report said.
-PTI