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Trimming staff in Bengal? Buddhadeb speaks the unspeakable: The Indian Express
Kolkata, Sept 24: It would be an understatement to say Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has stirred a hornet`s nest. The cosy world he is threatening to disturb comprises some nine lakh, equally prickly and highly pampered state employees, who may find themselves shunted out to rural pockets as part of the CM`s plan for a slimmer, optimal-use workforce in a Left bastion that is hearing such words for the first time.
Kolkata, Sept 24: It would be an understatement to say Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has stirred a hornet’s nest. The cosy world he is threatening to disturb comprises some nine lakh, equally prickly and highly pampered state employees, who may find themselves shunted out to rural pockets as part of the CM’s plan for a slimmer, optimal-use workforce in a Left bastion that is hearing such words for the first time.
The order for staff assessment came on September 12 following a meeting on improvement of work culture in government offices. It pointed out that in the wake of introduction of IT and computers in offices, the state government has found that not all its employees are gainfully occupied, and seeks to correct this.
Whether it turns out to be a Jayalalithaa-like reshuffle or a Narendra Modi-style redeployment, Bhattacharjee seems to be continuing his efforts to rationalise government working
The September 12 order asks every department to compile a list of all categories of personnel (regular, contractual and part-time) employed with it by October 31, 2003, and then make an assessment of the optimal number it requires. The assessment has to take into account the changes brought by computers and IT, and even new designations which may be required.
The whole exercise has to be completed by December 31 and reports sent to the administrative cell of the Personnel and Administrative Reforms Department, which will place them before an apex committee to be headed by the Chief Secretary. This apex committee will file its recommendations for redeployment of manpower by January 31 next year.
Fortunately for Bhattacharjee, the coordination committee of state government employees—an organisation backed by and affiliated to the CPI(M)—has backed the government move, assuring thousands of its worried members that their ‘‘service benefits’’ will not be hampered.
‘‘After all, we don’t want a government employee to earn his pay packet without doing any work,’’ asserts the coordination committee’s secretary, Smarajit Roy Chowdhury.
What may be playing more on the minds of workers is where the redeployment may take them. It is open knowledge that while considerable funds are now being directly channelised to panchayats for projects in education, roads, water supply, sanitation, irrigation etc, work is at standstill for want of adequate manpower and huge vacancies.
Therefore, the redeployment may in all probability mean moving employees from state and district headquarters to these rural pockets, admits Sandip Dasgupta, a central committee member of an employees’ association. ‘‘We are apprehending even worse—drastic reduction in manpower,’’ he adds.
A senior state government bureaucrat says the CM has touched one of the ‘‘most contentious’’ areas in the state, hanging fire for a long time. However, as he quickly notes, it may continue to do so for even longer.
In 1984, the state government-appointed Ashok Mitra Commission for Administrative Reforms had referred to similar overlapping of jobs in government departments and posts. The fact that Bhattacharjee has had to go in for another assessment two decades later shows not much headway has been made since.
The September 12 order asks every department to compile a list of all categories of personnel (regular, contractual and part-time) employed with it by October 31, 2003, and then make an assessment of the optimal number it requires. The assessment has to take into account the changes brought by computers and IT, and even new designations which may be required.
The whole exercise has to be completed by December 31 and reports sent to the administrative cell of the Personnel and Administrative Reforms Department, which will place them before an apex committee to be headed by the Chief Secretary. This apex committee will file its recommendations for redeployment of manpower by January 31 next year.
Fortunately for Bhattacharjee, the coordination committee of state government employees—an organisation backed by and affiliated to the CPI(M)—has backed the government move, assuring thousands of its worried members that their ‘‘service benefits’’ will not be hampered.
‘‘After all, we don’t want a government employee to earn his pay packet without doing any work,’’ asserts the coordination committee’s secretary, Smarajit Roy Chowdhury.
What may be playing more on the minds of workers is where the redeployment may take them. It is open knowledge that while considerable funds are now being directly channelised to panchayats for projects in education, roads, water supply, sanitation, irrigation etc, work is at standstill for want of adequate manpower and huge vacancies.
Therefore, the redeployment may in all probability mean moving employees from state and district headquarters to these rural pockets, admits Sandip Dasgupta, a central committee member of an employees’ association. ‘‘We are apprehending even worse—drastic reduction in manpower,’’ he adds.
A senior state government bureaucrat says the CM has touched one of the ‘‘most contentious’’ areas in the state, hanging fire for a long time. However, as he quickly notes, it may continue to do so for even longer.
In 1984, the state government-appointed Ashok Mitra Commission for Administrative Reforms had referred to similar overlapping of jobs in government departments and posts. The fact that Bhattacharjee has had to go in for another assessment two decades later shows not much headway has been made since.