Srinagar, June 16: What has sparked-off a major concern in public circles, employees in the offices of Deputy Commissioners in Kashmir Valley are blatantly refusing to comply with the transfer orders issued by the Divisional Commissioner Kashmir a few days back. The transfers were made in the wake of recurring complaints that the staff stagnancy in the DC offices was badly affecting the service delivery, thus making the people suffer.
Highly placed sources disclosed to Greater Kashmir that the Divisional Commissioner’s office issued three transfer orders in the past week, which met with stiff resistance from a section of transferred employees. This, they said, is notwithstanding the fact that a majority of these employees had not been transferred for years together, leading to multiple problems. In some cases, the employees had not been shifted for over two decades from their places of posting.
As per the orders, copies of which are with Greater Kashmir, at least 98 junior assistants were in DC offices in Kashmir were transferred to offices in other districts while a similar arrangement was made for scores of Junior Assistants, senior typists and senior assistants. The orders, according to the sources, were issued in a bid to ensure effective service delivery on ground and also make the system accountable and transparent.
“There are some employees who had not been transferred for over 20-years. This has led to many problems like their monopoly in the offices. There were complaints that many employees were not reporting to their duties while a few were not doing their job properly. There were also instances of malpractices, including delay in disposal of files, by some of the employees,” the sources said. “The Divisional Commissioner’s office thus thought it appropriate, after through deliberations with deputy commissioners, to shift these officials for betterment of the system. And the orders were issued as per rules and regulations, given the fact that there is a general policy of the government to go for transfer of employees after two years.”
However, once the orders were issued, a section of employees resisted the same for one or the other reasons. This time around, the sources said, the transfer order of Junior Assistants has already been put in abeyance while employees transferred vide other two orders are coming up with “medical certificates” seeking cancellation of transfers on health grounds—something which the Divisional Commissioner’s office is allegedly contemplating to “look into.”
This assumed rethink on transfers is, however, drawing flak from the concerned quarters, particularly the people and officials who had mooted such proposals from time to time.
“Why should the state government buckle under pressure from anyone if the order is legitimate? Recently it allowed protest by some employees in the DC office when Section 144 is in place in Srinagar. This is sending a wrong signal that the government is not in control of things,” said a Deputy Commissioner, who had, at one point in time, mooted a proposal to transfer employees from his office.
It has been reliably learnt that during a “security review meeting” at Islamabad (Ananatnag) sometime back, a deputy commissioner had suggested to the Chief Minister that the transfers in DC offices should be done for good governance. Sources said the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah agreed to the proposal, asking the Divisional Commissioner and the Deputy Commissioners to make efforts in cases within their competence.
However, with orders meeting resistance directly or indirectly, it has put a huge question mark on why the Divisional Commissioner’s office has put an order in abeyance besides entertaining applications weaver on transfers.
When contacted, the Divisional Commissioner Kashmir, Dr Asgar Samoon, admitted that the order pertaining to junior assistants has been kept in abeyance. “That is because the junior assistants belonged to the district cadre wherein officials are not generally transferred from one district to another, but within the district only,” he told Greater Kashmir.
Asked why the order was issued in the first place, Samoon said, “We had a detailed analysis of the order later and found that it would be injustice to go for inter-district transfers and accordingly sought to review it.”
Samoon said the employees are complying with other two orders. “We want to improve public service delivery on ground. We don’t want to harass anyone. Staff stagnancy leads to vested interests which hampers service delivery, which we can’t allow,” he said. “Officials, big or small, have to understand that transfers are a part of government policy wherein they are to be shifted after every two years. But here we had the cases that had not been transferred over one decade. Nobody had touched them.”
Samoon said the cases seeking waver on health grounds shall be examined dispassionately.

Lastupdate on : Thu, 16 Jun 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Thu, 16 Jun 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Fri, 17 Jun 2011 00:00:00 IST