Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Tuesday said the government would soon have a conclusive opinion from the Lok Sabha Secretariat on the issue of appointments at statutory posts in the absence of the Leader of Opposition as a member of the selection committees.
“We had this problem. We sought the opinion of the Secretariat of the Lok Sabha as to what would be the ideal way to proceed. I think very soon we will have a conclusive opinion,” said Dr. Singh at a press conference held to highlight the achievements of the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions in the first 100 days of the government at the Centre.
Dr. Singh said the process for appointment of the Chief Information Commissioner is under way. The post has been vacant after Rajiv Mathur demitted office on August 22.
“The Chief Vigilance Commissioner is still there, he is to retire at the end of September. We will take a call when that happens. The appointment of CIC and Information Commissioners is in process,” he added.
Listing the achievements of his Ministry, Dr. Singh said the age-old system of mandatory attestations and affidavits had been done away with and replaced by the universally accepted rule of self-attestation. Except for areas with security ramifications, self-certification would suffice.
Dr. Singh said necessary amendments to the relevant legislations would be carried out soon and instructions issued.
Stating that his prime goal from the first day of assuming the charge was to simplify governance to make it citizen-centric, the Union Minister said another breakthrough had been made in the field of pensioners’ welfare relating to their pre-retirement counselling and post-retirement engagement.
The government has also disposed off 6,197 of the over 10,000 pending grievances of pensioners.
The Ministry is also planning to abridge the existing gap between various pension schemes. A meeting on the issue was held a couple of days ago with the representatives of retired government employees’ unions.
Dr. Singh said the Ministry had with an incredible speed facilitated setting up of the State administrative machinery in the newly created Telengana.
Another priority for the Ministry has been reduction in the processing time and fast-tracking of decisions. This year, cadre allocation to those recruited through the Union Public Service Commission was done in 12 days compared to 148 days the previous year.
The Department of Personnel and Training is also amending the rules to widen definition of “sexual harassment” and “workplace” to better the working conditions for women employees.
