Government trying best to clear backlog of promotions: Jitendra Singh

The Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) of Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions Jitendra Singh on Monday said the Department of Personnel & Training (DoPT) is trying its best to clear the backlog of promotions which had accumulated for several years.

He said while the Government led by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi follows a policy of zero tolerance towards corrupt and non-performing officers, at the same time it is also supportive towards performing officers of integrity.

Singh was responding to a delegation of Central Secretariat employees who called on him here today and sought his intervention for timely promotion of lower grade staff members.

They also submitted a memorandum on behalf the Central Secretariat MTS Association, wherein it was submitted that many of the lowermost working professionals in the Government of India get deprived of even single promotion during their entire service tenure.

In order to bring in the ease of governance as well as objectivity in empanelments, the government has, in the last three years, improvised upon the procedures so as to ensure that there are no subjective preferences involved in carrying out the promotions," Jitendra Singh said.

"The procedures have been made more hi-tech using sophisticated technology tools to minimize the human interface," he added.

Singh said he himself personally feels disturbed to come across cases where some of the employees working in the lowest rung of administration spend their entire service tenure of 30 to 35 years without securing a single promotion.

The Minister also regretted that in a large number of cases, stagnation in promotions was the result of litigation amongst the employees themselves and even though the DoPT tries its best to put forward its view in the court of law, the delay becomes inevitable.