A meeting of Secretaries on States Reorganisation in the presence of Salahuddin Ahmed and A.N. Roy, the newly-appointed Advisors to Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan, resolving to ensure that IT architecture (portals) and services for residuary Andhra Pradesh and Telangana were in place by the month-end.
Chief Secretary P.K. Mohanty introduced the subjects at the meeting. The IT services were considered vital because most transactions, payments of scholarships and other welfare grants were being made online, directly into the bank accounts of beneficiaries.
Also, heads of the 19 committees entrusted with the task of allocating employees, completed the task of employee allocation for the two States, depending upon the population, by the month-end too. As of now, there 56 Secretaries and how they would be divided between the two States and allocations to be made accordingly, figured in the meeting.
At the in-camera meeting, it is also learnt that there would not be any downsizing of department - for example, clubbing agriculture, horticulture, sericulture and animal husbandry into one broad umbrella and likewise, the welfare departments including those for backward classes, scheduled castes and tribes and minorities.
For the few days, reports have been doing the rounds about how the number of departments per se, would be reduced through an elaborate exercise of downsizing and it is understood that at Thursday’s meeting, the issue came into focus. While departments like Culture and Minority Welfare have already filed their reports about the allocation of staff for the two States, bigger departments like Panchayati Raj and Revenue, to name a few are yet to do so.
The officials concerned were asked to ensure that all bifurcation-related works progressed according to the timeline, with specific focus on staff allocation, strictly in tune with relevant rules and regulations.
