Procrastination!
- Three Drawing and Disbursing Officers draw their salaries in Old Pension Scheme since June 2010, against the Government ban.
- Inaction of the department shows slackness in or complexity of the case.
- It is time to act against such malpractices to protect the sanctity of Skill Development Department in J&K, so that people may have faith on it once again.
jj correspondent
Jammu, Nov 30: Why are not the senior officers of the Skill Development Department of Jammu & Kashmir acting against the corrupt and shady employees working in the department? Who is the person or persons batting for non-action in this big fraud? Are these crooked employees bigger then law of land? When these wicked employees still at large and not being prosecuted? These are very critical question irritating in the mind of people, whereas these questions are very genuine and must be answered by the administration.
The Manual of Office Procedure is intended to serve as a guide for regulating office procedure in the office of Heads of Departments. Any reference issued from the office which originates the file is called Arising Reference. In this case where Drawing and Disbursing Officers of Skill Development Department are abusing the official position for themselves were appointed under Non- pensionable Scheme and are drawing their salaries under Old-Pensionable Scheme, the Arising Reference is letters under No. DTE / 101/ 1068-69, 1070-71 and 1072-73, Dated 01-09-2010 issued by Deputy Director Technical Education ( Mr. Reyaz-ul-Amin, now retired ) to (a) Executive Engineer Electrical Engineer Sumbal, (b) to Superintending Engineer Electric Main Rural Station District Baramulla, (c) to Executive Engineer Div. Raj bagh etc. from Directorate itself, without having any pre-existing communication from any quater, for sending the previous service record of newly appoitees regarding the matter. What was his cause of action? Officially nothing. How did he know personally that the newly appointees were appointed previously in other offices is not witnessed by any reference of the case. Number of Superintendants in ITI sector of Skill Development Department were appointed by the Govt. vide Order No.92-Edu(Tech) of 2010 dated 14-05-2010 under New Defined Contribution Pension Scheme but this order does not show in any way Imran Wajahat Hussain, at S No.4, Aijaz Majid Kakroo, S No.5, Showkat Anwar Rather, S. No.1, RBA category and Jawaid Ahmad, S. No. 2. ST category, as previous employees of any other department. As such Deputy Director’s letters under no’s 1068-69, 1070-71 and 1072-73 dated 01-09-2010 show that he worked in tearing haste without even informing the Director and abetted the said beneficiaries, who had approached the said department of Technical Education not with clean hands. His malafide action of giving undue benefits to the newly appointed Superintendants under OPS became a ground to the Planning Section of the Directorate to allot the budget to the newly appointed to draw their salaries from General Revenue of the State. This point is substantiated by an official correspondence from the Director Technical Education vide No. DTE / 101 / PF-17 /1605 dated: 02-08-2012 to Secretary Technical Education that made it clear that neither of the above incumbents fulfil the condition No.01 of the Finance Department put in vide their No. A/ 36/83-ll /128 dated 31-01-2011 regarding appointments made after 01-1-2010 i.e. ” the incumbent has applied through proper channel ” and hence are not liable for Old Pension Scheme. The Director made it also clear that above incumbents moved the High Court through medium of SWP No. 1245 of 2012 titled Imran Wajahat Hussain and others v/s State of J&K and others seeking continuation in the Old Pension Scheme.
It was up to 28-01-2020, for 10 years almost, these officers were drawing their salaries under Old Pension Scheme in connivance with the Directorate. Then it was only on 28-11-2019, under No. DTE /101 / PF-17 / 1637-40; then on 18-12-2019 under No. DTE/101/PF-17/1869-73 as “Reminder- 1, Urgent” and on 28-01-2020 under No. DTE/101/PF-17/3005 that Director Technical Education (SDD) shot a letter to these Officers with a copy of the News Item published in the daily Early Times dated 19-11-2019 regarding their drawing salaries under Old Pension Scheme and to furnish the detailed report into the matter. The question here is if the required file was already available with the Directorate and the matter was writ large, why they sought the required information afresh and started to look into the matter again.
However, on 05-03-2020, after 10 years Director, SDD reiterated vide his letter No. DTE/101/PF-17/ 3273 on para vii, line No. 04, addressed to Principal Secretary to Govt. Skill Development Department that after perusal of the reply furnished by them, “It was witnessed that all the incumbents does not fulfil the Finance Department condition No.1 and also the papers relating the condition No.2 are not available in the case file”. “This clearly indicates that all these incumbents were to be governed by the New Defined Contribution Pension Scheme w.e.f.01-01-2010. They have not applied through proper channel to the post of Superintendant because they were not in service.” It was again on 25-01-2021 that Director Finance, SDD, wrote to Director SDD, regarding his letter of 22-12-2020 to furnish a detailed report regarding the matter vide his No. DSD/Accounts/03/2021, though the Accounts Officer had already sought report regarding the matter on 04-04-2012 vide his No. DTE/101/ PF-17/730-35.
Again on 25-03-2022, Deputy Director (Trainings) Skill Development, vide his letter No. DSDD/101/2022-01/527-530, under subject: “probe of pv (k) No.82 /2021/ of Police Station Crime Branch Kashmir shoots a letter to above quoted 3 officers (in the capacity of their being DDOs) that the Crime Branch has sought the certified copies of their Service Books and have been requested to furnish the same within 2 days.
The daily Jammu Jottings published a news report on July 28, 2022 regarding the same issue and a Special Audit was conducted in the Directorate but final report is yet awaited.
It was actually Deputy Director’s letters dated 01-09-2010, written in tearing haste, that benefitted the newly appointees illegally, on the fugitive grounds, on the cost of the State Exchequer. Otherwise they were required to simply resign from where they worked as they did not apply through proper channel for the post of Superintendant. And the previous service record was not required to be linked with the new place of posting as has been done in the case of many other newly appointed Superintendants, the reliable source reveals. Now it is either slackness in or complexity of the case that it is stretched over 12 years to correct a mistake committed for vested interests.
