HARYANA FACING CRUNCH OF BUREAUCRATS WITH 21 PERCENT POSTS LYING VACANT

Following the retirement of 14 IAS officers last year, Haryana continues to witness and face the crunch of bureaucrats and it undoubtedly keeps affecting  functioning of the government as well as the development projects. According to the Gradation and Distribution List (Haryana Cadre) of IAS officers of the Government of India, the list of the IAS officials who have superannuated last year includes  Pradeep Godara, Bhupinder Singh, Ajay Malik retired, Amit Jha, Rajeev Arora,  Devendra Singh, Amarjit Singh Mann,Sarup Verma, PK Das, Chandrashekhar Khare, SN Roy, Hardeep Singh, Tarun Bajaj, Hardeep Singh and  IAS Varinder Singh Kundu. 

Out of the aforementioned retired officials, PK Das and Devender Singh were given the responsibility of chairman in the Electricity Corporation by the government and as irrigation advisor to the Chief Minister respectively. It is a noticeable fact that PK Das and Devender Singh  remained in the good books of the government as they dealt with critical issues skillfully.  Further, Wajir Singh Goyat, Dr Mahavir Singh, Jagdeep Singh, Dharmveer Singh, Arun Kumar and Vinay Singh are yet to retire in forthcoming four months.  Notably, in wake of the shortage of the bureaucrats, the Chief Minister has demanded the government to allot an extra quota of the officials to Haryana last year.  

The state has a cadre strength of 215 IAS officers and 46 posts are lying vacant. With around half a dozen officers on Central deputation, the state is presently left with just 169 IAS officers. Besides, six of the newly appointed IAS officials have been allotted Haryana cadre recently.  Apart from aforesaid, the issue of re-engaging or giving extension to the retired officials also has remained in discussions in political spheres as well as in the IAS lobby. Even, IAS lobby is a divided house pertaining to the matter. Some of the officials are of the opinion that in case a retired eligible official gets an extension or reemployment, then no one should come up with an objection. Contrary to this, several officials strongly oppose the extension of reemployment saying that despite the retirement, several IAS officers have greed and affection for the government facilities and power. Besides, what came to fore is that assignment of the portfolio of IAS officers to IPS officers led to annoyance of the IAS lobby in the state.  

Earlier, Shakuntala Jakhu, the Chief Secretary then in 2014 was given extension of three months on the ground of conduction of assembly election during the regime of Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the former Chief Minister. The issue led to controversy then as the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) had strongly opposed her extension. Except this, no such administrative development  took place in terms of  extension of an IAS official of Chief Secretary rank earlier.